“We’ve been in the business a long time, actually,” William said. His sister Irene manages All Seasons Turf Grass, a retail business run on a turf farm in Brookshire, TX. She supplies mostly sand-based sod for golf courses and sports fields. William explained there is also Horizon Farms, another entity of their operations that produces cotton, corn, soybeans, and milo. William’s wife, Jenny, helps him daily with farm and office tasks. William’s sister Rachel is also involved, and her husband, Ryan, helps with production on the sod farms. As Horizon Grass Farms moves into its third generation operating a turf business, William said their biggest accomplishment would be their expansion. “We’ve been blessed. We’ve had my dad, sisters, Rachel and Irene, and now our children coming on board. It’s nice to have a family business that’s turned into a sizable business,” he said. “We all run it together and get along. It’s nice having a family run a big business like this. We’ve always had the mentality of working together, and if there’s a rough patch, we smooth it out.” Willie is happy that there are family members willing to carry the torch forward to keep Horizon Grass Farms in operation. Of his eight grandchildren, several are already working on the farm, and he anticipates more of them will follow suit. “Naturally, my children started in the turfgrass industry in their earlier stages. William, my son, has pretty much always been in that industry from day one, row cropping and then working his way into turfgrass. And both my daughters are involved in the business and working in this area too,” Willie said. “It’s great to see my children and grandchildren be involved.” William has two daughters that graduated from Texas A&M that work at the farm. Caroline does work in the field at the farm and Haley does a lot of marketing on the sales side. He also has two sons, Garrett, a Junior in high school, and Connor, who is in sixth grade. William said he isn’t going to twist their arms to join the business, but like his father, he anticipates they both will as time goes on. “They tend to follow in my footsteps and seem to be enjoying it so far,” he added.
Production Horizon Grass Farms has grown tremendously over the past four decades, now supplying sod to roughly 20 nurseries throughout the state. William said they’re able to produce a large quantity of turfgrass with high-quality standards thanks to the excellent foreman and managers on their farms. “It’s a team, united effort between all the employees to maintain the quality. It’s a combination of the good cultural techniques and competition between farms that helps employees want to produce quality sod.”
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