- Last month, Leigh Bailey and Jamie Redmond broke ground on a $8.5 million high-tech facility in the Flora Industrial Park.
Chances are, if you’ve relished a delicious salad at an independent restaurant in the Metro Jackson area, it comes from Salad Days Hydroponic Farm.
Last month, Leigh Bailey and Jamie Redmond broke ground on a $8.5 million high-tech facility in the Flora Industrial Park, adding 65,000 square feet to the farm’s 21,000 square feet.
In 2025, after the facility is completed and new crops are ready, Bailey and Redmond will finally be able to start crossing off clients from a longstanding wait list of fine dining establishments, food distributors, and grocery store chains.
“We’ll be able to increase our production volume eight times over current levels with only three times the additional space,” said Bailey.
The popular pesticide-free lettuce is distributed to clients in a 200-mile radius around Flora, which encompasses parts of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana, and Tennessee. At any given time, 75 to 100 restaurants serve their lettuce rather than having leafy greens shipped from thousands of miles away in California, which produces a vast majority of America’s lettuce.
“Diners don’t even have to ask; they can tell when the salad comes out if it’s Salad Days. We’ve created a society of lettuce snobs,” Bailey said, with a laugh.
Salad Days has sold lettuce to Kroger and Sysco; they agreed to wait until Salad Days had the volume to supply their needs. Corner Market sells their lettuce from two stores but wants it in all their 14 stores.
Salad Days sells to Sunrise Produce, Robertson Produce, Gulf Coast Produce in Biloxi, and Covey Rise Farms in Louisiana, home of Covey Rise Lodge, a full-service hunting experience, which takes the product into the New Orleans market.
The Genesis
Bailey, a Jackson native, real estate broker, and daughter of well-known real estate developer H.C. Bailey, and Redmond, a real estate broker from Columbus, Ga., met about 15 years ago through the hobby of hunting. After dating long distance for a couple of years, the pair decided to marry. They wanted to collaborate on a business project outside real estate, somewhere in the Metro Jackson area.
“We spent some time just kicking tires on what we might like to do,” she said. “We’re both very outdoor people and gardeners. We investigated several ideas, but nothing quite fit. We ran across an article about hydroponic farming and found a grower in north Mississippi producing tomatoes, who let us visit his farm. We were fascinated with the whole idea that you don’t even need dirt. You’re not subject to the weather. You’ve got so much more control.”
Indoor hydroponic farming, also known as Controlled Environment Agriculture, involves placing plants in a growing medium like clay pellets, rock wool, or coconut fiber, using nutrient-rich water solutions to optimize growth.
Bailey and Redmond spent two years researching hydroponic farming, reading reams of books on the topic, and conducting market research. Bailey even studied at the University of Arizona’s Controlled Environment Agriculture School in Tucson.
“Being from Jackson, I knew a lot of chefs, so I asked them, ‘if I could grow this produce, would you buy it?’ And they said absolutely,” said Bailey.
In late 2013, the couple built a hydroponic greenhouse and had product coming out in 2014.
“People thought we were nuts, and we probably were,” said Bailey, with a laugh.
Their crops for the first five years were an even mix of tomatoes and lettuce.
“They’re very different crops to grow,” said Bailey. “It would be a lot easier to master one, and then master the other, but we felt like, at our age, we had to go big or go home. We didn’t have time to spend 10 years learning one, and then the other.”
Shifting Focus
Bailey and Redmond determined tomatoes, though popular, had slimmer profit margins.
“Lettuce was the smarter choice,” said Bailey. “It’s much more forgiving, and less expensive to grow from labor and energy efficiency standpoints, so we converted the entire operation to lettuce. Even then, we didn’t have enough supply to meet demand.”
More specifically, Salad Days grows spring mix and Bibb lettuce, also known as butter lettuce. Both are sold as retail products and bulk packed for food service customers.
“Everything is packed as living lettuce with the root still attached,” said Bailey. “The freshness and shelf life of the lettuce is incredible. It easily lasts two weeks.”
Bailey and Redmond have been working on expansion plans for two years.
“Our new facility will be in the Flora Industrial Park,” she said, about moving operations a mile and a half up the road.
The new farm will have equipment from Denmark, an innovator in hydroponic farming. The greenhouse is being acquired from Prospiant, a U.S. company. Alan Lange joined Salad Days as a partner and was instrumental in assembling funding for the expansion. The City of Flora, Madison County Economic Development Authority (MCEDA), Mississippi Land Water & Timber Board, Mississippi Development Authority, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture provided financial incentives.
“We’re glad we were able to meet the needs of Salad Days to stay and grow in the area,” said Joey Deason, executive director of MCEDA.
What’s Next?
Another expansion? A salad cookbook? A restaurant? “I’m gonna have to let somebody that wants to stay up all night do that one,” Bailey joked about the restaurant.
Bailey and Redmond plan to keep the current facility operating at full tilt until the same amount of product is being produced in the new facility.
“We’ll phase out the old greenhouse,” said Bailey. “That technology is like a souped-up hobby system compared to what we’re about to build.”
The new facility is designed to be easily expandable by adding more growing areas without needing to start over with a brand-new building.
“Initially, we will have about one acre under roof of growing area,” she said. “There are farms in Texas and Georgia that are 15 to 20 acres under roof.”
Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce Commissioner Andy Gipson said other farms across the state grow lettuce on a small scale for direct-to-consumer outlets such as farmers’ markets.
“But Salad Days is unique in that it’s the only hydroponic lettuce farm of its kind in Mississippi,” he said. “Salad Days is making its mark on the produce industry in the state, mainly due to the high quality of their products, along with the foresight and perseverance of Leigh Bailey and Jamie Redmond.”
Lynne Jeter
