Vidalia Onion Factory

This Business has closed. Their prices were High So Bye Bye.

My son and my mom and I were fortunate enough to stop in and do their free tour. They had special Vidalia Onion Festival hours this weekend, so we stopped in and looked at their little shop as well. My son bought a spicy onion salsa and my mom and i both got mixes to make some sweet onion rings. They had various foods for sale, including some jellies, sauces, etc.
For the tour, our guide was Abbey and she was very knowledgeable about the onion, its beginnings and the process from how they grow the onions to how they are packed and stored. Did you know the Vidalia onion was created from seeds that were sent from Texas? It is the soil, not the type of onion that makes it sweet. Pretty crazy.
Her family has owned this business for generations and there were articles lining the walls of the factory entrance. There were also some colossal onions that you could hold.
The day we went, most of the workers were already at home, so it was just a tour of the machinery but not it in motion, unfortunately. Nothing a little imagination can’t fix right?
You could still imagine the onions on the conveyor, with the workers inspecting each to make sure they were A onions (good to sell), B onions (not perfect but good for creating into sauces and salsas), or unacceptable (which are thrown away) and the way the onions bounce off the rubber guard and into the basket at the end of their conveyor journey.
There were giant crates of boxes of onions everywhere and some forklifts with a few people driving. We toured the storage section which is where they put the onions when the weather outside is too hot. Ideal cold storage temperature is 34 degrees Farhenheit. Even with the cold chill turned off, walking into the massive room you could feel the difference in temperature. There were giant air bags hanging from the ceiling which kept the air pressure constant.
I was amazed by the sheer massiveness of it. It’s amazing how much care and time goes into a simple Vidalia Onion.