Old School Brand

As a hobby, David Hinson became fascinated with antique food production methods and equipment back in the 1980’s after purchasing a farm in his hometown of Albemarle, North Carolina.  Home cooked molasses and fresh pressed apple cider were the first products Dave made and in doing so, it occurred to him that these foods were exactly as they would have been, by manufacturing methods and taste, hundreds of years earlier.  He was hooked on the idea of recreating authentic tasting foods with pure ingredients, “prepared in the ways passed down from ‘The Old School.’”

Around 1989 Dave purchased an antique stone burr mill.  Building a small structure to house the equipment, Dave began the tedious process of restoring the equipment and learning milling.  In 1992, Old School Brand™ began selling our first grits and corn meal products.  That same year, Dave conceptualized and began producing about 25 additional items to accompany the corn products in the Old School Brand™ line.

One of our first “breaks” in the business was an appearance on QVC’s 50 in 50 Tour in 1995; another was an article about our family business in Taste of Home Magazine in the mid-1990’s.   The story of Old School Brand™ took many twists and turns through the years; most significant is the untimely death of Dave from cancer in 2010.

Since 2010, Robin Hinson and son Parker (now the miller) have worked to build Old School Mill, Inc. and Old School Brand ™.  Longtime employee and friend Sherrie Mauldin has worked alongside us in this process and in 2016, Makayla Morrow (Hinson since 2018) joined our team.  We still maintain Dave’s commitment to quality and service to our customers.  We never take our customers for granted and consider ourselves blessed to continue Dave’s legacy.  His commitment to “quality, purity, and goodness” are our guiding principles from the products we sell to the way we operate our business.