Potato Grower

26 POTATO GROWER | JANUARY 2019 As the 1980s transitioned into the '90s, MountainKing began hearing from some its restaurant customers about newfangled potatoes with yellow flesh that consumers just loved. The problem was, those chefs wanted more yellow potatoes than were currently on the market. None of MountainKing's contracted growers, most of them in Colorado's San Luis Valley, had ever grown anything but russet varieties. The company was not in the business of farming, but in a matter of a couple years, found itself growing Colorado's first yellow potatoes for the fresh market. "We had no idea whether Yukon Golds would even grow in Colorado," says Hoffman. "Well, that first harvest, we yielded more Yukon Golds than we knew what to do with. The chefs who were wanting them didn't want that many." So MountainKing reached out to grocery store chains, first in Texas, then expanding distribution from its home base. Today, the company is a premier distributor of yellows, with its Butter Gold- and Butter Red-branded potatoes in grocery stores across the country. MountainKing's 10,000 acres of farmland in Colorado now produce yellow, red, fingerling and creamer varieties; it contracts other growers in Colorado, Kansas and West Texas to fill its needs for russets, reds and round whites. "What we've learned," says Hoffman, "is that if you have something with a different taste and flavor—and if you can grow it commercially and make it affordable, your customers will buy it." That knowledge has gotten MountainKing to a place on the mountain with one heck of a view. MountainKing's yellow and red potatoes are sold under the brand names of Butter Golds and Butter Reds, respectively. MountainKing farms about 10,000 acres of its own land in the San Luis Valley, and buys potatoes from about 18 other growers in Colorado, Kansas and Texas.

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