Christmas tree growers beginning to win the marketing war against artificial trees
Monday, December 7, 2015
Growers like Fred Somerville face the same challenges as other cash croppers, but also must compete against artificial trees from China. Sales from the last two years suggest that they are gaining ground
by MIKE BEAUDIN
On the hottest day in July, a crew of migrant workers from Mexico is pruning a field of Christmas trees. Armed with machetes and pruning scissors, they're busy shaping trees for the upcoming November harvest. It's hard to imagine getting Christmas trees ready for market in the middle of summer, but it's all in a day's work at Ontario's largest Christmas tree farm.
Fred Somerville, president of family-owned Somerville Nurseries and Kriss Kringle Christmas Trees, oversees the farm, which produces Christmas trees, seedlings and ornamental nursery stock. The 3,000-acre operation is spread over about 60 different parcels of Class 3 and 4 land in Simcoe and Dufferin counties.
The Christmas tree farm, much of it now on land that once produced tobacco, has been the mainstay of the Somerville family since 1950. Since then, it has grown into one of the largest wholesalers in the country, providing full-time and part-time jobs for 120 people. Somerville Nurseries annually sells between three and four million seedlings and 130,000 wholesale Christmas trees.
Somerville, president of the Christmas Tree Farmers of Ontario, is at the forefront of the industry. He's developing new and innovative ways to compete against the onslaught of artificial trees made in China and sold in Canadian stores.
On the farming side, he faces many of the same challenges as other cash croppers – uncertain weather, weeds, pests, rising input costs and a volatile labour market. But his challenges are magnified because he has to spread those risks over the 15 years it takes his crop to reach maturity.
"One of our big innovations here is we are growing our own seedlings that we plant," says Somerville. "We aren't bringing in seedlings from western Maine or Oregon where the weather is different. Our trees are germinated here, so they are used to this environment. That's been a key for us."
Somerville Nurseries plants 200,000 trees a year to reap an annual harvest of 130,000 trees. Many either die from disease or don't make the grade. There are two million trees in the ground at any one time. Depending on the size and type, the trees sell wholesale for an average of $25 apiece.
Although most of the work is labour-intensive, Somerville is one of the few growers to introduce mechanization. A few years ago, he brought in grinding machinery that allows him to replant in a year instead of two to three years if the stumps are left to rot.
Somerville has also developed new tree species in an effort to meet the changing needs of the market. He developed a miniature Fraser fir that stands about three feet and is now growing a "skinny" tree.
For years, Somerville and other Christmas tree farmers have been waging a marketing war against the artificial tree. The message appears to be getting out. Statistics Canada reports the value of farm cash receipts for Christmas trees in Canada in 2013 was up 6.1 per cent from $52.1 million in 2012. Somerville says sales in 2014 and 2015 were also up about five per cent.
Ontario has 647 tree farms, the most in Canada. Christmas tree farms in the province average between 10 and 20 acres in size and are often situated on land unsuitable for other crops.
The most effective marketing tool is still tradition. Even in tough economic times, people will dig into their wallets to buy a tree at Christmas.
"We've been doing it for 65 years now, through good times and bad," says Somerville. "Sometimes I wonder why we do it. But it takes 10 years to get in and it would take another 10 years to get out of it." BF