WILCOX COUNTY, Ga. — Pitts, Georgia is located in Wilcox County, and not a lot of new businesses open up there, but one couple took a chance. They farmed there forever and they opened up a store. This weekend, you can have a sunny experience with the whole thing.
Clay Oliver planted over a hundred acres of sunflowers on his property. Right now, a 16-acre field is in full bloom.
"We grow these sunflowers for the sole purpose of making oil," he said.
For Oliver, that oil has garnered attention from across the country. He's even won several awards for his product, but letting folks in to see the beauty is a bonus of the crop.
"Once you see the vastness of the field and the color of the sunflowers, you're gonna smile when you see it, and just to walk out in it, see the breeze blowing them, it will put you in a better place," he described with a smile.
Valerie is Clay's wife, and they both just opened a gift shop to go with the sunflower fields.
"The first week we bought it, I thought we had lost our minds. It was layers and layers of being an oil station," she said.
Valerie says now, she and Clay don't have any regrets about spending a year and fixing this older property into a redo. It's a shop fittingly called "The Station," because it was originally a gas station.
"We are super-excited about having this in our little hometown that we love," she said.
The Station has plans for down the road, but they may have to run them by Luna, the mascot and new family puppy.
"Maybe they teach how to make pottery, make soaps, turkey calls," she projected.
So if you visit the Station this weekend, you also get the chance to soak in the sunflowers, a colorful two-for-one experience.
To get to the Station, which is the store, to check in for the sunflowers, take the Pitts exit off the interstate, which is 109. Follow the signs to town. It's about 15-20 miles. Go down Main Street and take a right at the light.
The field is open this Saturday and Sunday. It is $10 a person to experience the sunflowers.