Discover Homegrown Family Foods’ baking brands endorsed by master chefs and mom-and-pop bakers for over 85 years
Founded in 2019, Homegrown Family Foods (Homegrown) is the proud owner and distributor of the retail brands Kentucky Kernel, Southern Biscuit, Tenda-Bake, Southeastern Mills, Shore Lunch, Stiver’s Best, Nancy Jane, and Don’s Chuck Wagon, as well as foodservice brands Redi-Mix and Midstate’s. The company provides food products to grocery stores, convenience stores, restaurants, hotels, bakeries, and military bases throughout the US.
Priding itself on producing consistent, high-quality products the whole family can enjoy year-round, Homegrown’s product lines consist of premium self-rising flour, all-purpose flour, seasoned flour, soup mix, gravy mix, pancake mix, biscuit mix, cornmeal mix, batters, grits, and hushpuppy mix, servicing both retail and foodservice segments. Homegrown makes baking premium, delicious homemade dishes quick and easy. 
“My dad, brother, and I started the business in late 2018 initially as a holding company/investment platform to acquire food brands” Jack Stout, President begins. “At the time, we had a food manufacturing private equity fund that was nearing its maturity, which owned a mill in North Carolina called Renwood Mills. We owned Renwood via a joint venture with The Mennel Milling Co., a large miller in the US. We made our first acquisition through Homegrown January of 2019, acquiring the Kentucky Kernel and Don’s Chuck Wagon brands from Hodgson Mill in Effingham, IL.
“During those early years, many of Homegrown’s back-office functions were performed by Renwood, but fast forward to 2022, Mennel bought out the Renwood milling assets and we took full ownership of Homegrown, maintaining the majority under family ownership. At that time, we also took on the lease of a 50,000-square-foot warehouse in Conover, North Carolina, and 20 employees from Renwood came onto our payroll. It was at this time that we fully became our own operating company, so I think of us as being a little over two years old,” he elaborates.
“Our year one revenue roughly equates to our current monthly revenue, which illustrates the level of growth we’ve experienced over the years. We’ve experienced strong growth both organically and through acquisitions. In August 2023, we acquired the branded dry mix business from Summit Hill Foods, a similar playbook to the Renwood Mills deal, bringing on some employees that were previously at Summit Hill Foods, and also acquiring equipment associated with the Branded business. It was an extremely busy period for us as we were also transitioning to a new ERP system.
“We produce premium quality biscuit mix, pancake mix, self-rising and all-purpose flour, corn meal mix, bread mixes, batters, and grits. With our recent acquisition we have expanded our product portfolio to incorporate other dry mixes, such as soup and gravy. Our baking products can be found in most retail stores throughout the Southeast, such as Walmart, Kroger, Food Lion, etc. We also have a large focus on foodservice, selling mostly to broadline distributors, as well as producing some private label products. Alongside our product portfolio and acquisition strategy, a key factor of our success and growth is of course our people. Our folks are highly motivated, self-starters and we’ve been blessed on that front, so keeping our people happy is paramount to our success.”
Jack and his father’s experience in both the food industry and background in private equity has been integral to the successful integrations of these acquisitions, along with the support and expertise of the organization’s executives and board of directors. “My plate is full with the day-to-day business, but it has been really fun being able to evaluate deals with my dad as they come up. We both like to get deep in the weeds as far as due diligence and evaluation, and although we both start with our own process, most times we end up at the same answer.” With the acquisition of Summit Hill Foods, Homegrown needed an additional facility close to the existing business in Georgia, which would allow it to hire from the local talent pool. “We found one but actually thought it was too much space,” adds Jack. “That said, we figured we could grow into it, and we’ve done exactly that in a relatively short period of time. Our facilities currently tend to act as distribution centers, but we do carry out some light manufacturing in North Carolina. There is opportunity for us to move to in-house manufacturing in the Rome, Georgia facility in 2025 but we’re still evaluating which products might be the best fit for those lines and that location.”
Strategic growth
Preempting that development, the company has recently increased investments in food safety, as well as research and development capabilities. “This enables us to look at other brands more opportunistically and strategically,” Jack continues. “We can explore potential fits for our portfolio and establish whether a relationship would make sense economically. In terms of fit, we’re broadly looking for high-margin branded business with a proven track record of brand loyalty. We have certain geographies with very loyal consumer bases and it’s important to maintain those relationships while expanding brand presence. This involves further consideration around developing our permanent facilities more locally to service that growing demand. I enjoy this aspect of my day-to-day role; exploring potential opportunities, assessing their viability and planning for the future.”
Employee engagement is a critical factor for future success: “We strive to ensure folks are engaged and challenged within a culture of accountability,” Jack elaborates. “It’s important to have shared values that align with those of the overall business. Again, we’ve been blessed with great people and have a very low turnover of staff. We try to support our team in terms of training and development, which fosters a culture of continuous improvement and engagement. We’re a flat organization, which I think empowers people to have greater responsibility. We have people in managerial roles, me included, who haven’t necessarily had that type of experience before, and it’s satisfying when you can build a great team and keep them challenged.
“We’re continuously striving to improve, and that goes for our processes too. In terms of technology, as I mentioned before, we’ve transitioned to a new ERP platform and bolt-on software. We’re continuing to leverage technology to enhance things like food safety and increase supply chain resiliency. Looking at 2025, we’ll continue to focus on our current product offering and drive volume organically. We’ll also be looking to ramp up our in-house manufacturing capabilities which will certainly lead to a further increase in headcount. However, as far as internal investment is concerned, the biggest investment will remain our people. At the end of the day, our people are the biggest key to success.
“One benefit of our business is that we’re not bound by mandates that would be common to traditional private equity. We were intentional about this from the beginning, knowing that we wanted a capital structure that doesn’t force us to sell the business due to a set time horizon, for example. This has become an increasingly popular model within the private capital/family office space, where a buy and build platform allows operating business to thrive and also provides investors with an attractive return profile.
“We will remain strategic in how we deploy capital; I believe we’ll continue to see attractive assets in the branded food space that will allow us to be opportunistic from an investment standpoint. Whether it’s opportunities to add brands to the portfolio or increased vertical integration with the potential to acquire another operating business, we will certainly be on the lookout.
“We’ll continue to increase our engagement with local communities and enhance participation in local economies. One area that we will focus more resources to is non-traditional marketing. Engaging with consumers has changed a ton over the past decade, so we need to constantly adapt. While direct-to-consumer currently accounts for a small piece of the revenue, once we’ve grown to a certain volume, that may be an area for further growth,” Jack concludes. “From investing in technology to exploring improvements through research and development, we’re always examining ways to do business better.”