20 POTATO GROWER | JUNE 2021
Randy &
Karlene Hardy
"Our potato family."
That's how Karlene Hardy describes the people from across
the country she and her husband Randy have gotten to know
and work with over the couple's 50 years in the potato industry.
Well, if it's a family, Randy and Karlene Hardy could fairly
be called its patriarch and matriarch. They've dedicated as
much of their lives to the U.S. potato industry as just about
anyone. While their roots are and always will be planted deep
in the rich topsoil of their native Oakley, Idaho — where they
will harvest their 50th crop this fall — their reach extends far
beyond the little valley they call home.
But let's start with their home. The high school sweethearts
married in 1972 at the age of 19 and joined Randy's parents
on the farm. Two months later, his father unexpectedly passed
away, throwing the newlyweds into the deep end almost from
the get-go. But they wanted to swim, so swim they did. Over
50 growing seasons, the farm has grown from 300 acres to
about 2,800 today. Six hundred of those acres are dedicated to
potatoes, all of which are fresh-packed at Sun Valley Potato, a
grower-owned cooperative the Hardys joined in 1997. Randy