Good for the Green : Bigger, More Expensive Christmas Trees Are Back in Style
For the past 1,200 years or so, ever since St. Boniface Christianized the Germanic Teutons in the 8th Century and introduced ceremonial evergreen trees to replace the sacred oak of the god Odin, some people have been selling other people Christmas trees.
This year is no exception. Based on national statistics, Christmas tree sellers in the Los Angeles area probably will sell about 2 million trees this year, almost all of them shipped in from tree farms in Oregon and Washington. And despite a sluggish Southern California economy, Christmas tree sellers in the Long Beach area report--sometimes grudgingly--that it looks like a pretty good year.
In fact, some sellers say that area residents are buying even bigger, more expensive trees than last year.
“It’s been a very good year,” said Doug McGavin, manager at Pacific View Nursery on Studebaker Road in Long Beach. “For a while there, the size was coming down”--that is, people were buying smaller trees--”but now they’re moving up to bigger ones.”
They are also buying more expensive species of trees, McGavin said.
“By far, the Noble fir is more popular now,” McGavin said, despite the fact that a six- to seven-foot Noble costs about $50, compared to $34 for a Douglas fir of the same size.
Workers at the nursery also report a mini-boom in the sale of living Christmas trees, the Monterey pines and star pines that come in pots and can either be transplanted after Christmas or kept in a pot and used again next year. Prices range from $21 for a small tree in a three-gallon pot to $52 for one in a seven-gallon pot.
“We’ve only got one (living tree) left, and it’s a Charlie Brown,” said Debra Gordon, who runs the live side of the Pacific View Nursery Christmas tree business. (A “Charlie Brown,” she explained, is a spindly, pathetic-looking tree with missing branches.) “All the rest are sold out. We’ve probably sold about 30 so far this year. I’m hoping to get another shipment.”
Farther north, at South Street and Norwalk Boulevard in Artesia, veteran Christmas tree seller Laura Evola agrees that the Christmas tree outlook is bright.
“Business is very good this year,” said Evola, who has been selling Christmas trees for 16 years, six years at the same location. (When she is not selling Christmas trees, Evola raises flowers commercially.) “By the 19th or 20th I expect that we’ll be completely sold out of trees.”
Evola, too, reports that people are somewhat more quality conscious than price conscious this year. Her prices range from $9.95 to $125.
“People are looking for a quality buy,” she said, adding that a lot of customers who in the past may have bought a tree at a cut-rate chain store are coming back after discovering that their tree didn’t make it through the season.
“A lot of places get trees that were cut early, and they don’t keep the trees in water pans on the lot,” Evola said. “By Christmas, people see that their trees are getting pretty crisp.”
Of course, some Christmas tree sellers, like farmers and fishermen, are reluctant to paint too rosy a picture lest fate turn on them. Ted McOsker, who has been in the Christmas tree business since the Eisenhower Administration in 1957, is one of them.
“Aw, I guess we’re doing OK this year,” admitted McOsker, 57, as he stood in the Christmas tree section at Carolyn’s Florist and Nursery on Lakewood Boulevard in Bellflower, a Santa hat perched on his head, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth and his hands and face speckled with residue from the bleached white paper pulp, known as “flocking” in the trade, that he had been spraying on Christmas trees. “I guess we’re making enough to keep us in it until next year.”
McOsker figures he will probably sell 2,000 to 3,000 trees this year--better than some years, worse than others--at prices ranging from $11 to about $60.
McOsker said chain stores and home improvement and discount warehouses have siphoned off some customers by selling full-size trees for a mere $19.95. Despite the Santa hat on his head, McOsker expresses his disdain for such Christmas tree Johnnies-come-lately in most un-Santa-like terms. His tirade includes a scathing rundown of their business practices. “And they don’t flock,” he concludes. “Probably wouldn’t know how to!”
But chains are not the only problem, McOsker said. There’s the high fuel cost for shipping. The rain last Saturday. And so on.
But finally McOsker admits that he has not stayed in the Christmas tree business for a quarter of a century because he hates it, or because it’s a great way to lose money.
“Yeah, we make a pretty good living,” he said. “How do I like it? I love it. Everybody’s always happy when they’re buying a Christmas tree.”
Christmas Tree Tips
* As soon as you get home, lop a couple of inches off the stump of your tree and immediately put it in water. If you have it cut at the lot, go home immediately and put it in water before sap seals the cut.
* A Christmas tree can drink up to a gallon of water a day. Keep the water coming.
* Decide where your tree is going to go before you buy it. There is no sense buying a 10-foot tree for a room with an eight-foot ceiling.
* If you buy a flocked tree, wipe away some of the flocking and check the needles for dryness. Unscrupulous dealers may try to hide dried-out trees under the flocking.
* Keep your tree away from the heater, not only for safety’s sake but to retard the drying process.
