FAIRVIEW, Ky. — The Fairview Produce Auction has added a 15,000 square-foot building to its facility this year, to accommodate a sales volume that has increased in 14 of the auction’s 15 seasons.

The auction, located about an hour north of Nashville off U.S. Highway 68, within sight of the 324-foot Jefferson Davis birthplace marker at Fairview, reported total crop sales nearing $2.5 million in 2011.

“Building Number Two will help us streamline sales and handle the larger volumes coming in,” said Ralph Burkholder, auction manager, who expects total produce sales this year to near $3 million, assuming a normal growing season. The expansion, begun last year, was completed at the beginning of May.

Sales volumes have increased, said Burkholder, as existing sellers expand their production and as new sellers join the auction.

“More people have moved to the area, especially from Pennsylvania,” he said. Some 50 sellers in a 15-mile radius from the auction site now account for about 90 percent of the auction’s crop sales. “If a new grower comes in with a quality product, it does not take long for sellers to notice.”

Extra space was needed for the auction’s standby crops: flowers, melons and tomatoes. “We will have a huge increase in early tomatoes this year,” Burkholder said, “because there are a lot more tomatoes being grown in greenhouses and high tunnels.”

The auction’s early tomato and summer squash volumes are expected to increase this week as the local production season runs three to four weeks early. Burkholder expects to be selling from both auction buildings before Mother’s Day, when flower sales peak.

The new building will also improve the auction’s summer watermelon and cantaloupe sales. “We will be able to have growers deliver and unload everything under roof,” said Burkholder.

Many melons were previously auctioned using a “drive through” system. Growers drove wagons through a sales area, and then waited outside to unload wagons into semi-trailers. “Now everything will be on skids and under roof until a buyer is ready to load,” he said.

The Nashville-area market accounts for the largest part of the auction’s sales, said Burkholder, with flowers and bedding plants are mainly bound for the area from Louisville to Nashville.

“Nashville buyers will buy flowers well into the fall,” said Burkholder. On May 1, the auction sold more than 2,500 4.5-inch pots of annuals at an average price of $1.36. More than 700 hanging baskets averaged between $10.88-$23.60 each during the May 1 auction.

Tomatoes and melons are shipped further from the auction, primarily north and east, to markets as far as Chicago and Chattanooga. Last season’s shipments ranged from northeastern Iowa to western Ohio. The auction employs an order buyer, and other buyers range from produce brokers and wholesalers, to local landscapers and roadside stand operators.

Since April 9, four auctions have been held per week, every weekday but Wednesday. A special flower auction was held April 28, and weekly Saturday sales are added from July 7-Aug. 11. The four-sale schedule then resumes through Oct. 12. Auctions occur twice weekly through November, then weekly through the winter months.

Fairview Produce Auction was formed by a group of Mennonite farmers who moved to western Kentucky from Lancaster County, Pa. The auction emulated auctions in Mennonite and Amish communities in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Missouri.

The auction grew from less than $100,000 in total sales during 1997 to $330,000 in 1999. By 2006, produce and flower sales had increased to about $1 million. Sales leveled out during a following drought year, then increased each year since, to $2.5 million in 2011. The auction’s additional sales come from two large consignment sales of equipment and other goods each year.

A price report for each auction may be accessed at www.uky.edu/Ag/ CDBREC/auctions.html