CRESTVIEW — Bundrick Honey Farms has been beekeeping and selling locally grown honey in Crestview since 1984.
“My dad got two hives of bees about 37-40 years ago, and it grew from there,” owner Ken Bundrick said. “At one point we had a little over 2,000 hives of bees.”
The business is all family-run with several hundred bees and hives scattered across Northwest Florida. The store is on the corner of Robinson Avenue and Walden Street behind Domino’s Pizza.
“Our main seller is wildflower. That’s just local honey, what the bees work in our local area,” Bundrick said. “We also sell gallberry, which is a real light, mild honey, and we have orange blossom that we get from another family.”
Other honey available includes tupelo, which comes from the Choctawhatchee River area, along with dark wild flower, a darker version of the regular wildflower honey.
Bundrick says the local honey is different than the kind at a grocery store because it has not been processed.
“It’s raw,” Bundrick said. “Most of the grocery store honey has been filtered and this is just pure, raw honey straight from the bees.”
One benefit to that is the “wide variety of health benefits provided by our honey that may not be present in more processed products,” according to the store’s website.
Bundrick said the honey is sold by wholesale, retail and bulk. And it's available all around the area from Pensacola to DeFuniak Springs.
They also sell to local stores such as Body-B-Healthy, Outdoor Power of Crestview, and Brooks Farm in Baker. Many of the sales go to health food stores and farmer’s markets.
The store doesn’t only sell honey. Bee pollen, bees wax, beekeeping supplies and various antiques and collectibles are available for purchase.
For more information, visit bundrickhoneyfarms.com.
This article originally appeared on Crestview News Bulletin: Beekeepers produce locally grown honey