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Texas Agriculture Archive

September 20, 2002

Adjusting to the niches

Teamwork makes Northeast Texas operation pay...

Brent Ramage shows off one of the Ramage Old Farm Market's farm-fresh products.

Bart Ramage can barbecue up to 65 briskets at a time on his super smoker.

By Lana Robinson
Field Editor

Along Interstate 30 at Hooks, just this side of Texarkana, Ramage Old Farm Market's 70-foot silo adjacent to their restaurant/store is a sight for sore eyes for homesick Texans and a curiosity for Northerners venturing into the Lone Star State, perhaps for the first time. Long before you hit the door, you'll get a tantalizing whiff of barbecue. Follow your nose. One of the Ramage boys is likely to greet you with a howdy-do or handshake as you step inside.

"We're on the edge of Texas and uniquely positioned to give folks a taste of Texas coming in and that last bite of barbecue to send them on their way as they leave the state," says Bart Ramage, who with his brother, Brent, owns and operates the unique retail food and restaurant establishment.

"We like to think of ourselves as a liaison for the 'Yankees,'" adds Brent. "They see our silo and the cactus out front and they know for sure they're in Texas."

Inside Ramage Old Farm Market is pure Texas as well. Shelves are stocked to the hilt with farm-fresh goodies—preserves, syrups, candies, nuts, relishes, and sauces—and every nook and cranny boasts a horseshoe, bandana, boot, T-shirt, flag, mug or icon associated with this great state.

The brothers designed and built the 6,500 square foot facility.

"Every piece of tin and wood in here has a story behind it," says Brent, noting some ceiling lights from the old school in a new addition currently under construction. "This building is a permanent storage for a lot of the town's memorabilia—a deer head, old signs, cattle brands and other things people were happy for us to display. If they ever want them back, they know where they are."

Bart and Brent grew up on a 600 acre farm about five miles north of Hooks, with a population of not quite 3,000, and have raised their families here. They continue to farm and enjoy the rural way of life and small town atmosphere.

"We made a conscious decision to stay in Hooks. There are some business costs associated with staying in a small town, but we like it. We have a lot of friends here," notes Bart.

The Ramage brothers' parents, Jewel and Elizabeth Ramage moved to Hooks from the Central Texas town of Hico in 1955. They began growing oats, soybeans and coastal hay on their Red River bottomland farm. In 1960, Jewel saw an opportunity and reconditioned an old pecan orchard on the place. The trees had been grafted in the 1930s, but the pecan bottom had been neglected. Soon, he was selling pecans locally to friends and neighbors, creating a new source of farm income.

"When Brent graduated from A&M in 1978, he came straight back to the farm. I came back in 1985," Bart recalls. "At that time, we were farming hay and pecans. Then we decided to expand into blueberries. Next, we converted an old mule barn on the farm into a country store and started making and selling homemade preserves, pecans and pecan brittle. We were doing the jellies, nuts and gift packs—Christmas stuff, and that rocked along. We needed to be where there was traffic. So in 1999, we made the decision to build this store and restaurant."

Half the space is devoted to retail and the other half is for dining.

"We keep our menu simple. We have barbecue brisket, pork, pork ribs, and chopped beef, potato salad, your typical foods that go with barbecue. Then on Friday and Saturday nights, we serve steaks," says Bart. "It's a long hour deal for us, but it's working. People will drive 30 miles to come eat a steak on the weekend."

"We had a Wisconsin traveler stop in, a chopper pilot who'd been in 27 countries. He said the steak we served him was the best he'd ever had. Comments like that are gratifying," says Brent.

The Ramages sell more than 50 products in their Hooks retail store, through their mail order catalog and online.

"We manufacture jams, jellies and syrups in the commercial kitchen on the farm," says Brent. "We have a 2,000 square foot kitchen out there with 360-gallon kettles, work tables, and labeling system. I'm renovating that now for the fall season."

"We make candies and other stuff up here. Our kitchen here is FDA approved," notes Bart, and products bear the Texas Department of Agriculture's GO TEXAN logo. "We still cater parties at the barn on the farm. It's not open to the traveling public, but we do receptions and some other functions out there."

Ramage Old Farm Market employs six to seven full-time employees and about as many part-time, seasonal workers.

The brothers make a good team.

"I'm production oriented and Bart is the marketing and PR guy," says Brent.

They continue to market items to about 4,000 individuals, businesses and organizations on their established mailing list developed through their earlier catalog business, and they have added a web-based catalog for online shopping.

"It's a learning experience," Bart admits. "We send out brochures, and have the web site, but the bulk of our advertising dollars is tied into billboards on the Interstate."

The Ramages must be doing something right. The business sustains both families. Speaking of families, Bart and his wife, Ginger, a paralegal, have a 23-year-old son Adam, who is in the computer business in Dallas and a 17-year old son, Brien, who is a high school senior and member of the football team. Brent's wife, Cindy, teaches Speech and English at nearby Texarkana College. Their son, Matt recently graduated from Texas A&M and has a new wife, Tiffany. Matt plans to become a flight surgeon in the U.S. Air Force and after retirement, would like to come back to Hooks as a family practice physician. His brother Caleb is a freshman and in the corps at Texas A&M this fall. Brent and Cindy's youngest son, Micah, is a seventh grader. Parents Jewel and Elizabeth Ramage have also retired on the farm.

"I get to drink coffee with my mother almost every morning and have lunch there three or four times a week," says Brent.

"We also farm. And we still raise pecans," says Bart, who currently serves on the Bowie County Farm Bureau board of directors. Brent has also served in that capacity in the past and served on the Texas Farm Bureau Young Farmer & Rancher Advisory Committee in 1982.

According to the Bart, Ramage Farms was the first to establish a large commercial blueberry operation in the region, back in the mid 1980s. But after some 13 years of production, they recently gave up growing berries due to a cultural problem.

"You can't rotate blueberries like you do other crops. We had high salt and developed a root rot problem we couldn't overcome," he says. "We buy our berries for processing now."

Finding a good source is no problem for Bart, who is a charter member of the Texas Blueberry Growers Association (TBGA) and the Texas Blueberry Marketing Association (TBMA). He continues to serve as the TBMA marketing director for some 70 member growers.

Mother Nature also threw the Ramages a curve in the form of a damaging ice storm in their 20-acre pecan orchard several years ago.

"We lost a lot of limbs and mature wood, which dramatically reduced our crop," says Brent. "And it takes three to four years—maybe as much as five—to get back into full production."

Because things are always changing in agriculture, Brent is a believer in seeking ways to adjust, or finding niches to fill a void that has been overlooked.

"Dad found a niche in bermuda grass hay production. He always told us that you want to go where no one else is," Brent recalls. "At one time, we had 400 acres of square bales. There were lots of dairies. When they played out, we did the grass sprigging business. We've been doing that since the early '60s until now. The farm evolves. People who do not evolve with it get in a rut or go bankrupt or get the farm in the hole so bad they can't get out and they just have to throw the banker the keys. You have to adjust to the times or get sucked under."

One adjustment Brent recently made was to lease out his bottom land for the very first time in 2002.

"It's some of the best land in the county—400 acres of prime, tillable ground. I leased it to a fellow from Ames, Iowa. He farms 34,000 acres here, in Missouri, and Iowa. I want him to be successful, to be able to maintain his lease. I can tell you that he lost money and I made money this year.

"It's hard to make it in traditional agriculture," he continues. "Most of our wives work off the farm to support our habits. Several years ago, I made a decision that I was not going to farm away all our equity. That started us thinking about the value added products. We can put the pecans in a roaster or in candy and market them for twice as much."

Brent says looking ahead to retirement was also a powerful motivator.

"You know, as a farmer, you really don't have any retirement. You can sell all your assets, and live on that, but if you want to keep them, you've got to have some other income. That's what I see here with what we're doing. We're becoming more focused on what we're doing and it will grow in value and continue to generate an income," he says. "I'm building my retirement."

Ramage Old Farm Market is located at exit #208 and I-30 in Hooks. For more information, call 1-800-627-0278; 903-547-6187; or email: ramage@ramagefarms.com. Or visit the Ramage Farms web site: www.ramagefarms.com.