On a recent Tuesday afternoon, The Mill of Bel Air is humming with activity. Winter is still hanging on outside, with a few snow flurries descending, but Bel Air's retail home for all things agriculture is in a much warmer mood.
Customers stream through the North Main Street business, surveying the newly-delivered bunnies and baby chicks or checking out farming supplies.
Next to the main building, where a big banner thanks "you for naming us Harford County's best lawn & garden center," employees help people find hay at the warehouse where a row of The Mill's trucks stand ready to go.
The man behind The Mill since 1986, president and store manager Henry Holloway, is brimming with facts and ideas, not just about the store but the multi-faceted world of agricultural business. When he gets on a roll, Holloway can talk about everything from distribution logistics to the complex diet of a modern dairy cow or a 1,300-pound butcher steer.
Holloway, who runs the business with his wife, Brenda, observed he is one of the only feed stores left in the area. Thirty years ago, Harford County had about 10, he said. Fountain Green Farm & Supply in Churchville may be the only one that still grinds a little feed, he noted.
Even The Mill is a mill in name only, having closed its "old, antiquated, terribly inefficient" feed processing building in 2009, Holloway said. Both the existing Mill store and the old mill were built in 1886.
It's a far cry from the business' roots as the Reckord Mill, built by Henry Reckord and renamed Bel Air Farm Supply by Holloway's grandfather, Smith Walter.
Holloway, however, knows it's the direction the agricultural business must go. He turns 56 on April 10, approaching the average age of an American farmer today, he said. In his typically modest demeanor, Holloway denied that his business know-how plays a significant part in The Mill's staying power. Instead, he said, The Mill has simply stuck around while its competitors aged out of the business.
"We're probably the only agricultural influence left in the Town of Bel Air," Holloway observed from his low-key, third-floor conference room, overlooking the Main Street traffic rushing by.
"Southern States used to be across the street; you used to have some equipment dealers in Bel Air," he said, adding that people even used to hatch chickens on the second floor of The Mill building. Holloway acquired three Southern States locations in recent years.
Holloway pointed out some other supply stores: Hickory International on Conowingo Road; Walter G. Coale Inc. in Churchville; and Atlantic Tractor in Whiteford. Fountain Green Farm & Supply also sells feed. But, he said, "as far as agricultural heritage in Harford County, [The Mill] would be the last piece in town."
The Holloway family, which has long ties to a 400-acre farm in Darlington, has been a mainstay of the northern Harford farming community in general. Holloway and his wife bought another, 100-acre farm in the same area. Harford County Executive Barry Glassman, who has his own farm in Darlington, said The Mill has survived under Holloway's guidance as he saved the design of the old mill despite remodeling the building.
"What they've done is, they've been able to aggressively market suburban homeowners, whether they're going to green their gardens or green their lawns, but also they service the horse industry through fencing materials, bird seed for those folks who like to feed their birds. So they've been able to adjust to the market that not only provides traditional livestock feeds but they've expanded into pet care and birds and all the little animals that a lot of suburban homeowners like to have in their house," Glassman said.
The Mill continues to boom with new classes and offerings, some of which seem to surprise or amuse Holloway. A recent Chicks Night Out event held at the Hereford store drew 180 people to Friendly Farms in Upperco. Another such event attracted more than 300 in Jarrettsville, while one in Airville, Pa., between the Red Lion and Whiteford stores, got 100 – "and that's just people coming to learn how to raise chickens," Holloway said with a laugh.
The Baltimore Bonsai Club was among those holding classes recently at the Bel Air store, and Holloway had an employee share the story of how the club left a "gorgeous" bonsai tree behind that was reportedly worth $2,500.
From Richmond to Pennsylvania, he said, such business "is going to be good because of our population."
"Within that area, you have got a class of people that have got the money to be able to go out there and buy locally and know who you're buying from and how it was raised, and there's like an added level of confidence in the quality of product that you're buying... and supporting local agriculture," Holloway said. "That market, in that geography, is going to be really good."
The "farm-to-table" movement will also keep growing, he predicted.
"If people have 10-, 15-, 20-acre patches where they could be growing some produce, they've got some fruit trees, they've got some berries, they could have a few specialty crops within that niche market that they're trying to produce, we want to supply the inputs," Holloway said about The Mill's future.
"We have a number of different families regionally that are doing direct-market beef, direct-market pork, direct-market lamb. In addition to that, you've got a couple of creameries selling ice cream, cheese," he said. "Those markets are going to be really good, I think."
Holloway keeps spinning out ideas for everything from offering heirloom tomatoes to new types of classes, pointing out the renewed interest in home gardening and canning. Three canning classes at The Mill this year drew about 50 people each, he said.
"We need to get more involved with the small-farm, direct-market 'foodies,' and I see opportunities there," Holloway said.
Although the Bel Air building remains The Mill's headquarters, the business has continued to grow since Holloway came on board in the mid-1980s. Although he said he was, effectively, talked into taking over The Mill, he remains the only one of his siblings to have gone into the agricultural business and is considered a farm-related business leader in the community.
"My grandfather coerced me into coming to work for him in the fall of '83, and I worked for him [until], in Jan. 1 of '86, he sold me the business," Holloway said, explaining his expansion into the Black Horse, Hampstead, Hereford, Whiteford and Red Lion, Pa., stores.
"This was the only facility for what we call The Mill. In 2003, we added two more stores and I took on partners. In '07, we added a fourth store, and then January 1 of 2011, we added two more stores," he said. "The markets of each of those stores while similar are all a bit different because of geography and because of their focus."
All products come to the Bel Air store by tractor-trailer load and are re-distributed to the other five stores. The Mill distributes to most counties in Maryland, passing over the lower Eastern Shore counties and the area west of Hagerstown. Delaware and the southern tier of Pennsylvania are also in the market, he said.
Holloway again turned modest when asked about a claim by a Southern States representative, quoted in a Maryland Horse Council newsletter 11 years ago, that The Mill "has one of the most sophisticated delivery route systems [in the mid-Atlantic]."
"That's a bit of a stretch," Holloway said with a grin, but added: "Our guys in the warehouse, particularly a fellow by the name of Leigh Walker, have done a very, very good job logistically of moving material through there and we've got a terrific dispatcher that handles the delivery of trucks and a great guy by the name of Nick Shreve that puts together all the goods going to the other stores. The software package we have is pretty nice, and that helps a lot."
"Those guys are constantly challenging themselves to improve and to reduce cost, because distribution is expensive," he said. "So, ideally, we'd have a warehouse like this one at each store, but we can't afford it."
Robert Tibbs, a farmer who has been active as a liaison between the Harford County Farm Bureau and the Harford County Council, said The Mill is "a lot bigger and a lot more modern than what it used to be" and, despite renovations, "still blends in with the town's businesses."
"I worked for Henry's grandfather's competitor back in 1960 and 1961, the Prospect Mill down on Prospect Mill Road," Tibbs recalled. "At that time, I think there were six mills in the county that were actually grinding feed and serving the farmers of Harford County."
Tibbs said he respects the Holloways for continuing the operation, even while "of course, no one in Harford County is grinding feed anymore."
"It's nice that one family can take over and do the whole thing and still keep agriculture as a central part of the county, which is very important," Tibbs said. "He's up to date on the politics and he knows who to talk to and which group needs to be advised about something, and he's not afraid to ask farmers to go help."
Cecelia Ann Zubal, of Forest Hill, was shopping at The Mill recently and said she has been patronizing the store since moving to Forest Hill in 1971.
"It's always a pleasure to come in here, there's so much to look at," Zubal said, calling the store "iconic" and comparing it to "a neighborhood hardware store, but dealing with other things."
"We've been coming here for years and I think it's a pretty important part of Bel Air," she said.
Although Holloway, originally working as a swine consultant in the Midwest, may not have foreseen himself as The Mill's proprietor, he seems destined to stay at its helm for years to come.
"It's been very rewarding for us financially – not only financially, but also, we just like doing it," Holloway said, adding with his characteristically dry humor: "Brenda keeps telling me she needs to retire but she keeps showing up every day. I've even set it up so she can get away and she keeps showing up every day."
"It's fun. I like dealing with the people," Holloway said. "The farm people are the best in the world."