The farmers on Fox’s latest season of “Farmer Wants A Wife” gathered to discuss what to expect on the program, country & Western culture’s popularity.
Four farming cowboys walked into a bar for a media day.
There’s no joke involved.
On a bright Wednesday afternoon at Nashville’s Twelve Thirty Club overlooking Lower Broadway, Colton Hendricks, Jay Woods, Matt Warren and John Sansone, the ruggedly handsome quartet of stars of Fox’s third season of “Farmer Wants A Wife,” are seated around a table, each sipping an old fashioned. They are all laughing about how out of character it felt for them to be perpetually asked to be more emotionally open about dating 32 available bachelorettes to the showrunners during the episodes they just completed filming.
“When a woman is picking out a man, being a cowboy brings a certain level of currency to the table. Sure, they might want a guy with some money, but a guy being a cowboy is right up there (insofar as most desirable traits). You put me looking super hot on a horse up against a millionaire and I guarantee you that she’s going to choose me,” says Hendricks, 28, about the show’s appeal.
The divorced dad of a two-year-old son from Mena, Arkansas, a town half-hour from Oklahoma’s eastern border, is resolute and steel-eyed in his proclamation.
Not all of the farmers are as forthright as Hendricks, but for sure, this is a class of farmers-turned-TV stars who wear their emotions on the sleeves of their pearl-snap shirts instead of letting them linger for too long in their minds.
‘Farmer Wants A Wife’ brings country music bent to prolific TV franchise
For over four decades, the concept of the “Farmer Wants A Wife” TV franchise has a lineage dating back to Swiss television’s 1983-debuted program “Bauer sucht Bäuerin” (“farmer is looking for a female farmer”). The program led to six marriages, four of which lasted.
Since then, “Farmer Wants a Wife” has developed into a television dating franchise responsible for versions in nearly three dozen countries, resulting in over 200 marriages and almost 600 children.
For season three of “Farmer Wants A Wife,” the role of host shifts in country music royalty from Sugarland’s Jennifer Nettles to Grand Ole Opry member Brad Paisley’s wife and noted actress and philanthropist Kimberly Williams-Paisley.
In another country music connection with the show, the intimate event at the Twelve Thirty Club also featured Spirit Music group-signed songwriters Brent Anderson, Jessica Cayne and Connor McCutcheon — notable for hits including Scotty McCreery’s 2024 chart-topper “Cab In A Solo” — in a songwriting round at hosted by The Big 615’s veteran radio personality Storme Warren.
“Stargazing,” co-written by Cayne, will open the first episode of the latest season.
Season 3 highlights current farm industry headlines
Unlike other seasons, the latest edition of “Farmer Wants A Wife” feels more in tune with actual farming than directly branded within country music and television’s role as a platform for country and Western culture’s surge in American pop culture.
The quartet farms everything from avocados and exotic fruits to cattle, corn, soy and wheat.
As of late, their already arduous jobs have grown more complicated.
The 2022 Census of Agriculture reported a half-decade loss of nearly 150,000 farms nationwide, resulting in America’s overall farm acreage dipping under 900 million.
“Increased regulations, rising supply costs, lack of available labor and weather disasters have all squeezed farmers to the point that many of them find it impossible to remain economically sustainable,” said American Farm Bureau Federation president Zippy Duvall.
“We’ve got it tough right now, for sure,” says California-based avocado and exotic fruit farmer Warren, 30, about overseeing 200 acres of produce. “So as much as I’m on this show to find love, I’m going to use my time to bring awareness to (the plight of) small, family-run operations in America.”
Multi-generational and Alabama-based cattle and hay farmer Woods, 25, a former Duke University football player, continues: “The good, bad and ugly sides of seeing my family sometimes having to sell our land then repurchase it makes times right now hard because you’re unsure if the next generation of the family will be able to preserve our memory.
“You’re not doing this job for the money; you’re doing it for the love,” he adds.
‘Cool culture and great-looking guys…’
St. Louis-based Sansone, 25, is the most heavily mustachioed of the quartet and thus closely resembles 2024 Country Music Association award-winning vocalist Riley Green.
He’s not from a background of college football and construction work like the “You Look Like You Love Me” singer, though. Instead, he’s one of five children and an aspiring lawyer who, when not farming 170 acres of his great-grandfather’s land, is fishing, hunting for bullfrogs, or going on drives in the woods with his grandfather.
About appearing on a show where he chose from eight different Western-culture-enamored women — including a trio of urban-based Texans — for the potential of long-lasting love, Sansone agrees that commoditization attached to the farming lifestyle and Western culture has fantasized and romanticized the grit away from farming.
However, he feels that it hasn’t removed the inherent romantic appeal of a gentleman who isn’t “crude or profane,” but chivalrously removes his hat and stands up when a woman enters the room or comes to the table.
“You can’t avoid noticing that country is cool again,” says Woods, paraphrasing the title of a 2024-released Lainey Wilson song. “People will always appeased by cool culture and great-looking guys.”
“Farmer Wants a Wife”‘s third season premieres on March 20 at 9 p.m. ET. New episodes will air weekly at the same time and be available to stream the following day on Hulu.