Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
BENSON, Cache County — A Cache Valley family is making a business out of their love for Halloween. They're known for their giant pumpkins and pumpkins grown into face molds.
It's not enough to just have a pumpkin patch. Katie Seamons and her husband, Jim, gave up years of dairy farming for their pumpkin business.
"He started growing giant pumpkins to be competitive," Katie Seamons said. "And it's still trial and error some years. We (did) really good this year. The heat played a big factor — because it was hot."
The two try to grow about a couple hundred giant pumpkins each year. And then there are vampire faces, Frankenstein, and the "Trumpkin."
The Trumpkins didn't turn out this year, but they have sold for more than $200 a piece in the past. It's not an easy process, and a lot can go wrong.
"You have to get the pumpkin to the right size, which is about a softball," Katie Seamons told KSL-TV. "And then we go out, we find them. We have to bolt the molds on."
They are known as Cache Valley Giant Pumpkins. People can visit the patch, pick their own, or try out some novelties and several hundred pounders.
"As the years progressed, we figured out, like, the tricks of fertilizers, bug sprays, things like that," Katie Seamons said.
Now, the Cache Valley business is extending way beyond Utah. Jim Seamons is currently in Texas with their pumpkins.
"It's a little surreal. I mean, it's out of my comfort zone," Jim Seamons told KSL-TV.
A couple of festivals, known as Pumpkin Nights, hired him to bring out two semitruck loads of the big ones to Austin and Arlington.
"They average about 600 pounds. But, you know, each pumpkin is a different size or different shape, so it becomes a logistical nightmare," Jim Seamons said.
Each night, he is out with the pumpkins. "I'm out here carving pumpkins and just entertainment for people," he said.
It's a passion for Halloween that has taken his family farther than they'd imagined.
"It's been a journey," Jim Seamons said through a laugh. "I don't know where it's going to end."
Jim Seamons told KSL-TV that the pumpkin patch has been more fun and more profitable than dairy farming. The Seamons said they will keep on growing the business to see where it takes them.
"I think we're just riding with it right now," Katie Seamons said. "We're just going along with it."
