Grinnell’s Back Forty Honey brings home top honors at ISF

​     The Cody Family of Grinnell, owners of Back Forty Honey, are shown at the Iowa Honey Producers Association both at the state fair. From left is Isabel, 13, Andy, Rachel, 16, who won a blue ribbon for “The Best of Iowa Honey” class this year and Angie. The Best of Iowa Honey class is judged on by taste.

By J.O. Parker
 
       Back Forty Honey in Grinnell is the recipient of a number of top ribbons and honors from this year’s Iowa State Fair.
       The awards were presented by the Iowa Honey Producers Association (IHPA) in connection with the state fair.
         The IHPA has a booth on the second floor of the Agriculture Building.
The business, which is located south of Grinnell, is owned and operated by Andy and Angie Cody and their two daughters, Isabel, 13, and Rachel, 16.
         The “Best of Honey in Iowa” class went to Rachel this year. The class is judged only on taste.
In addition, Andy brought home 15 ribbons including five first places, four second places and two third places for the company’s honey products.
         This includes observation hives on display at the Iowa State Fair, dipped wax candles, round comb honey and chunk honey (the comb honey in liquid), Amber extracted honey, square comb honey and a couple beekeeping photos.
         In addition, Back Forty Honey is positioned to win the IHPA Sweepstakes honor in 2026 for a third straight year, having won it in 2024 – 2025. The IHPA will announce the winner at its fall conference. 
How it all started
       The Cody family got into beekeeping thanks in part to a co-worker of Andy’s at Jeld-Wen. Andy worked in corporate management at the time at the Grinnell location. He has also spent time with the company in Oregon and central California.
      “A friend and co-worker, Steve Hardeman, at Jeld-Wen asked about putting bees on our timbered 40 acre property and I decided to join him,” said Andy. “We had six colonies that first year and Back Forty Honey was what we called the first harvest.”
          And the business kept growing from there.
By 2019, the business had grown to 40 – 60 hives.
         In 2019, with 20-years of service at Jeld-Wen, Andy left his full-time job to concentrate on the bee keeping business and to raise his girls.
Then 2020 hit and Andy said the role of stay-at-home dad took on a new meaning.
“Actually, I enjoyed the shut down and being at home with the kids,” he said.
           Today, the business oversees more than 240 hives, most all in the Grinnell area.
        And according to Andy, the business is expected to produce 20,000 pounds of honey in 2026.
         “I always come up a couple hundred pounds short of what I thought I’d produce because my family eats it all,” he said with a chuckle.
          When asked how the honey producing process works, Andy said after the bees produce the honey, he gathers the boxes of honeycomb in late-July through September and brings them home.
       “The honey is sealed in the comb and we uncap the comb and place them in a honey extractor where the honey is spun out of the comb,” said Andy. “From there, the now liquid honey moves to large settling tanks where any remaining wax or debris settles out of the honey. The honey then goes into 5-gallon buckets (available on Facebook Marketplace), or barrels for longer term storage or to a bottling tank to fill the retail size bottles.”
          The business offers 2 ounce and 12 ounce bears, 16 ounce glass or plastic bottles, 24 and 32 ounce squeeze bottles and 80 ounce (5 pound) jugs, and 5-gallon (60 pound) buckets. The business also offers cut comb and some beeswax products.
            “We only sell the buckets directly to the consumer,” he said.
             Andy said his biggest customer is Van Wijk Winery in Sully.
         “They actually won best of show (at the state fair this year) for their Blackberry Mead (honey wine),” he said.
            The winery buys honey from both Back Forty Honey and Eberts Honey in Lynnville. The two companies work together to provide honey products in the area.
          “They (Eberts) operate at a different scale than I do and we help each other out,” said Andy. “I send my colonies to California in the winter with Eberts to pollinate the almond groves when they bloom in February.”
Where to purchase Back Forty Honey
        The honey is available at several locations including Freedom Firearms in rural Grinnell, Pioneer Bookshop in Grinnell, Brooklyn Grocery in Brooklyn, Nancy’s Canned Creations in Newton, Three Sisters in Montezuma and the Grinnell and Newton Hy-Vees. Grinnell Farm to Table also offers our full product line-up, both on their bi-weekly on-line market and during Saturday afternoon store hours.
          For more information, Back Forty Honey can be reached at: [email protected].

​      A close up of Rachel’s “The Best of Iowa Honey” that she won a blue ribbon on at the Iowa State Fair. The class is judged only on taste.

     The Cody Family of Grinnell brought home a large number of ribbons from the Iowa Honeybee Producers Association at the 2026 Iowa State Fair. Daughter Rachel, 16, won a blue ribbon for “The Best of Iowa Honey” class.