Claim to Fame: Considered a "giant agribusiness" by many urbanites
Highlights: This giant agribusiness is made up of Barry, his wife, three kids, and 73-year-old father.
Barry's Story
A Few of My Favorite Things
See Barry in Action
Hear from Barry
Barry Evans is far from a rich corporate mogul, but gets called one nearly every day by the handful of zealots who seemingly want to return to the days of mule-drawn plows.
Barry finds the whole situation almost humorous because similar critics existed when his grandfather first purchased the Evans farm in the 1920s. Back then, people complained that "rich" farmers were ruining agriculture with new inventions like mechanized tractors, cotton harvesters, commercial fertilizer, and hybrid-seed.
Since its inception in the '20s, the Evans farm has been all about respecting the land and finding efficiencies to produce more with less, all so that one generation could improve the prospects for the next generation of family. A self-proclaimed technology junkie, Barry is an early adaptor of new technology and equipment-just like his grandfather and father.
Barry is always looking to help his family's 2,000-acre cotton and grain sorghum farm boost yields, protect the environment, and compete against heavily subsidized foreign growers.
But being efficient and taking care of the land and water resources doesn't come cheap. The harvest equipment used on the Evans farm cost $260,000 and his tractor came in at a whopping $145,000. New seed varieties, remote steering devices to reduce fuel consumption, and equipment to decrease chemical applications also carry hefty price tags.
Barry doesn't need his business and economics degree from West Texas A&M to realize making ends meet is tough as farming becomes more expensive. According to USDA's local economists, every acre of cotton planted this year will cost Barry $581 for seed, fuel, fertilizer, equipment and other inputs, and $775 when fixed costs like land rent and labor are included.
That means Barry will spend at least $581,000 on the 1,000 acres he will plant to cotton—and that doesn't even include the costs he'll incur to plant grain sorghum on other acreage.
Repaying the bank loan Barry needs to plant his cotton crop is always nerve-racking because his one crop per year (and one payday) is at the mercy of the weather and countless other variables such as falling cotton prices that are currently as low as they were when Barry was a kid.
Whenever he gets worried, though, Barry takes comfort in his family. All of the Evans' farms survived the Great Depression. His father, Billy, lived through the farm crisis of the 1980s and is still farming today at 73 years old. And chances are his son, Eric, will overcome similar problems—and similar critics—when he takes over the family business in the future.
