For over 100 years Lehi Roller Mills has been producing high-quality baking flour. The majority of the mill's flour goes to larger corporate and bakery clients. However Lehi Roller Mills sells gourmet baking mixes both online and in national retail outlets. Recently Lehi Roller Mills responded to healthy lifestyles by introducing Heart Healthy Hotcakes.
By 1905, Lehi farmers were getting tired of hauling wheat to American Fork for milling — something they had been doing for 15 years since the Spring Creek Flour Mill went out of business.
But in June of that year came an announcement in the Lehi Banner: A group of businessmen and other shareholders, who each invested $20,000, were forming a co-op to build a "a new flour mill with modern pattern and equipment."
It was state of the art for early 20th-century America, and the new mill turned out it first flour on April 2, 1906.
One hundred years later, the Lehi Roller Mills is still doing what it does best: turning out high-quality baking flour, says Sherman Robinson, current owner and manager of the plant.
Robinson's grandfather, George G. Robinson, purchased the mill in 1910, and it has been owned and operated by the Robinson family ever since.
"My great-grandfather was a millwright and miller in Delaware," explains Robinson. "He came to Utah to help set up some early mills. In those days, almost every town had a flour mill or a grist mill. His son — my grandfather, George — came with him, and he stayed to work at a mill in American Fork. Then he bought this mill."
You could say that milling is in the Robinson genes. "Somewhere in America, for the past 200 years, there have been mills operating under the Robinson name. But, if you go back over the ocean, my ancestors have all been flour millers since the 1500s," Robinson says.
One of the mill's greatest brushes with fame came in 1984 when it served as the backdrop for "Footloose," starring Kevin Bacon and John Lithgow.
"That's been 24 years, but we still get calls from people who want to have their picture taken on the porch where Kevin Bacon packaged flour. I've been surprised how much impact that movie had. When it first came out, we had a full-time person on the phone answering questions," Robinson says.
Lehi Roller Mills currently employs about 50 full-time workers. That swells to about a hundred around the Christmas holidays to take care of the demand for the mill's mixes.
That all got started because Robinson had a dentist friend who wanted something from the mill to give to his clients. "He kept bugging us, so almost as a joke, my wife took some Christmas material and sewed some bags, and we filled them full of 25 pounds of flour."
They were surprised at how quickly and impressively the idea caught on, but they soon realized that 25 pounds was too big, so they decided to try something smaller. "We came up with a pancake mix. Because of minimum requirements, we had to do 5,000 of them. I thought, 'What will we ever do with all these?' But we introduced them the first of November and by Thanksgiving they were all gone."
Today, the mill offers a variety of mixes, not only for pancakes but also for muffins, bread, cookies, brownies and more. That retail business has been one of the things that has helped the mill survive, says Robinson.
The majority of the mill's flour, however, goes to larger corporate and bakery clients.
"In 1952, my father sold Pete Harmon his first bag of flour for his Kentucky Fried Chicken. KFC still buys flour from us." They also sell flour to Sarah Lee, Interstate Brands, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and a lot of local bakeries. "A lot of people eat a lot of our product and are not aware of it," Robinson says. About 50 percent to 60 percent of the flour goes out of state.
He is also quick to point out that while the mill may be 100 years old on the outside, the inside has been changed and upgraded several times over the years to where they have state-of-the-art equipment. While the basic process remains the same, "we have better quality control. It's safer. We can grind more in the same space. The technology hasn't changed; it's just more sophisticated."
Why the Turkey?
A frequent question at the Lehi Roller Mills is: What do turkeys have to do with wheat?
People see the big Turkey Red Wheat sign, and "they ask if we're feeding turkeys," says Sherman Robinson, owner and operator of the mill.
Turkey Red Wheat comes from wheat that was brought to this country by a group of Mennonites who came from Turkey, he explains. "It became very popular. It's what made America into a wheat-producing country." It was planted in the fall and then grew in the spring.
"Today, it's sometimes called hard red winter wheat, but it's still the primary wheat we use." The gluten and protein content, as well as the flavor, make it ideal for baking, he says.
Source: (
visit link)