One couple’s beekeeping hobby leads to sweet success.

A family camping trip to a friend’s farm led Nick Kauffman and his wife, Renee, to a successful and fulfilling career making honey and beeswax bath and body products. While on the trip in June of 2006, Nick was invited by his friend, who owned several bee colonies, to accompany him to check the bees.

“I was fascinated,” Nick says of his first encounterwith beekeeping. “I decided right then and there to get some bees of my own.”

That simple act planted the seeds for Honeysuckle Acres, a honey-manufacturing company located in Hickory Hill. Nick was operating heavy equipment for his family’s business at the time he embarked on the journey that would lead him to develop a thriving honey-making business. Starting with just four colonies, Nick began his operation by reading books on beekeeping and honey making and consulting with other beekeepers. But for the most part, he honed his craft through hands-on experience.

“It became sort of a run-away hobby,” Nick jokes.

Today Nick cultivates anywhere from 36 to 50 bee colonies at a time, and Honeysuckle Acres, which today churns out about 25,000 containers of honey a year and ships products to all 50 U.S. states, provides full-time employment for him and his wife. Like many small, locally-owned business owners, Nick and Renee began selling their products at area farmers’ markets and local events, such as fairs and festivals. To supplement the kinds of honey they sold, the Kauffmans bought flavored honey sticks from another vendor and sold them alongside their products. The honey sticks were a popular item, which sparked Renee to come up with the idea of flavoring whole jars of their honey.

“I, myself, thought it was a ridiculous idea, but I went ahead and humored her,” Nick admits.

The Kauffmans began by making small jars of honey infused with flavors like strawberry, peach, raspberry, lemon, and vanilla. The honeys proved to be popular, leading the Kauffmans to take their products on the road, often traveling up to 35 weekends a year to market to stores, shops, and specialty businesses.

Sporting the slogan, “It’s honey. Reinvented,” Honeysuckle Acres’ products are 100% natural, and every product they develop meets high quality control standards.

“If it’s not good enough for me and my family, I’m not going to make it and sell it to someone else,” Nick says.

Nick believes it’s this commitment to quality, as well as the ingredients and processes he uses, that sets Honeysuckle Acres’ honeys apart, as does the wide variety of flavors (40 to be exact) the company offers. His two most popular honeys are the cinnamon creamed honey, which tastes much like an iced cinnamon roll, and the hot honey, which one local Jefferson City pizzeria uses to make its hot wings.

Nick is quick to point out the many uses for honey, and many Honeysuckle Acres items come with recipes and tips. He promotes the natural sweetener as a delicious addition to coffee, oatmeal, and yogurt and a traditional spread for bread, biscuits, and bagels. His family puts honey on popcorn, and honey-glazed salmon is a favorite meal.

An offshoot of the business, and almost as popular as the honeys themselves, are the bath and body products the Kauffman’s make from bee byproducts, such as beeswax. These creations include soaps, lotions, scrubs, and lip balms. Renee has also branched out into making scented beeswax candles.

Rounding out Honeysuckle Acres’ merchandise is a product that has nothing to do with bees or honey, but came about because Nick loves salsa. It’s a spice seasoning called Speedy Salsa that can be used to make instant salsa simply by adding tomatoes. The mix can also be used to flavor chili, tacos, and fajitas and to make dips and spreads.

Despite the Kauffmans’ success, Nick still considers Honeysuckle Acres to be a micro-business. He and his wife are the sole employees and handle all aspects of the operation from start to finish, including manufacturing, bottling, labeling, shipping, and marketing.

Find their products at:

Dogwood Vintiques
Fischer Farms Pumpkin Patch
Ice Cream Factory
JC Health Foods
Robert’s Drug Store
Southbank Gift Company

In addition, Honeysuckle Acres products can be found at specialty shops and stores throughout the state and ordered online at honeysuckleacres.net.