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Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minuteDriver Scan →Scott Family Farms’ growth from 60 acres to 14,000 was a decades-long transformation, not a single expansion. The North Carolina family rented land, added sweet potatoes as a second cash crop, then built a branded packing and export business around them. These figures describe the farm as reported in a January 2019 feature; they do not establish its present-day size or operations.
How the Scott family expanded its acreage
Sonny and Alice Scott began farming in 1968, working 60 acres of tobacco along with some corn and soybeans. They expanded over time by renting additional acreage. After Linwood Scott Sr. died in December 1976, Sonny and Alice took over the farm. Sonny wanted another strong cash crop that could reduce the operation’s reliance on tobacco.
The scale of the change was striking. Sonny Scott, identified in the feature as Linwood Scott Jr., said of his late father, “He wouldn’t recognize it,” referring to the modern operation. In 2019, Scott Farms covered 14,000 acres around its home farm in Lucama, North Carolina.
Why sweet potatoes became central to the business
In 1983, Scott Farms planted 15 acres of sweet potatoes. The crop was a practical addition because some land-preparation and transplanting practices overlapped with tobacco. The farm began packaging and marketing sweet potatoes in 1985, moving beyond growing the crop to selling it under its own business.
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Dewey Scott returned to the farm after college in 1996 and helped develop the branded sales business. Sweet potatoes eventually became the farm’s most profitable crop, according to the 2019 feature. Tobacco remained important, while grains played a role in crop rotation.
How packing and exports extended the farm’s reach
A European buyer’s interest in the late 1990s opened an export channel. For about six years, the family sold abroad through a buyer; in 2006, it established a U.K. operation. Scott Farms opened an office in the Netherlands in 2016.
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The farm built a 60,000-square-foot packing and shipping facility in 2015. The feature describes this approach as vertical integration: the business handled production, packing, branding, and distribution to maintain control over how its sweet potatoes were treated and delivered. Dewey Scott explained, “The reason we chose to do that and integrate and have a hand in every step of the chain was to have as much control of the product, as possible – how it’s cared for, and how it’s distributed.”
By the time of the January 2019 article, Scott Farms reportedly exported 20,000 tons of sweet potatoes annually to the U.K. and Europe. Its U.K. shipments grew from 125 container loads in the operation’s first year to 1,000 containers by 2018. The farm sought a sales mix of 55% domestic and 45% international, according to that same feature.
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The feature also placed the farm’s expansion in a broader market context. Citing USDA Economic Research Service figures, it reported that U.S. sweet-potato exports rose from 100 million pounds in the 2007–08 market year to 605 million pounds in 2016–17. It said about 40% of U.S. sweet-potato exports went to the U.K. and another 20% to the Netherlands. U.S. per-capita sweet-potato consumption was reported to have increased from 4.2 pounds in 2000 to 8 pounds in 2017. These are historical figures as presented in the January 2019 Agriculture.com / Successful Farming feature, not current market measurements.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How a diverse crop mix supported the operation
The 2019 article listed approximately 1,200 acres of tobacco, 3,000 acres of sweet potatoes, 1,000 acres of wheat, 1,000 acres of corn, and 6,000 to 7,000 acres of soybeans. Those rounded estimates do not add up to one exact acreage ledger, so they should be read as reported crop figures rather than a precise reconciliation of all 14,000 acres.
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Rotation was a practical reason to grow multiple crops. Linwood Scott described using other crops between sweet-potato plantings, aiming for two intervening crops. For tobacco, the farm sought at least three years—and preferably four—between plantings to reduce disease pressure.
The feature reported typical yields of about 40 bushels per acre for soybeans and 60 to 70 bushels per acre for wheat. Corn averaged closer to 140 bushels per acre, although recent yields at the time were around 180. These are the farm’s reported figures in the 2019 account, not current yield benchmarks.
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Expansion also meant managing a larger workforce and the logistics of seasonal labor. The article reported 125 to 150 full-time employees and about 270 seasonal workers hired through the H-2A temporary agricultural worker visa program. Alice Scott described transportation and housing as part of the expense and process of seasonal hiring. These staffing details are also a 2019 snapshot.
The story’s broader business lesson is that acreage alone did not account for the farm’s transformation. Renting land and taking over the family operation expanded its production base; sweet potatoes added a second cash crop; and investments in packaging, branding, and export distribution created more ways to earn value from each harvest. As Sonny Perdue, then U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, put it in a statement quoted in the feature: “This family-owned operation grew from a small 60 acres to 14,000 acres in 60 years. They’ve expanded not only in size, but also in what they produce and where they sell it, to become an international company.”
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