Tuesday, local students received a lesson on the inner workings of a local company specializing in protecting beehives.

The Haselmaier Company is a family-owned business in Carriere, which has designed an innovative tool to prevent small hive beetles from destroying a beehive. The invention is called the Beetle Baffle, which forms a protective barrier around a hive and makes it almost impossible for beetles to breach.

Jennifer Whitfield, production manager for Beetle Baffle, spoke about the family-run business to dozens of gifted fourth, fifth and sixth graders from South Side Upper Elementary at her company’s warehouse located in Carriere.

“The barricade is made up of aluminum strips and we place these strips into kits and ship them all over the world,” Whitfield said.

The Beetle Baffle makes it difficult for beetles to move upward into the comb of the hive. At night, beetles try to regain entry into a hive but when daytime comes around the bees push the remaining beetles out of their hive, Whitfield said.

The field trip was part of the students’ 10-week lesson on consumerism and public and private goods and services, South Side Upper Elementary Teacher Susan Barker Spiers said.

“We’re giving students a chance to see how a business works firsthand,” Spiers said.

Whitfield said she never thought the family business would grow as quickly as it has. The company started two years ago when Whitfield’s father, Haynes Haselmaier, invented the Beetle Baffle in what is now the company’s warehouse. The company currently has 200 distributors and their patent on the Beetle Baffle is pending.

“We’re just a family that has done this. My dad built the first prototype here with his tools. When he put it on one of his hives, he thought it would take a couple of days for the beetles to go away but it took only 24 hours,” Whitfield said.

She said her father got the idea to patent his invention once it proved successful.

Currently, Whitfield, along with business partner Wynn Heneter, make up the production team who package and distribute the Beetle Baffles.

“We’re about to get to the point where we’re going to have to hire more people. It’s a matter of quality control. I want to make sure they care as much about this as I do,” Whitfield said.

The family not only manufactures the Beetle Baffle but they also make homemade honey on the property.

After the presentation, Whitfield gave students samples of honey.

For more information about the company, visit beetlebaffle.com.