Christmas tree shoppers have a range of options

WATERVILLE VALLEY, N.H. – Some U.S. consumers are going over the Internet or through the woods to find fresh Christmas trees this year, taking advantage of shopping options at opposite ends of the cost spectrum.

In one camp are thrifty folks paying as little as $5 for trees they harvest themselves from national forests. In the other are consumers willing to spend significantly more on trees they order online and have shipped to their doors.

Chris Proulx, 39, of Conway, snagged a tree from the White Mountain National Forest the weekend after Thanksgiving and set it up on his porch.

Finding a good tree was a challenge, Proulx said. But in the end, it wasn’t about the tree. He compares it to taking his kids fishing in the Swift River, which runs through the forest in the summer.

“You do it not because the best or biggest fish are there. It’s more about the experience. It’s the same thing with these trees. You’re not going to bag a trophy tree,” he said. “The average person who comes in might call you a blockhead and say, ‘Nice job, Charlie Brown, you picked out the perfect tree.’

“But if you know that it’s from the national forest and you know what it took to get it, it looks better to you than it will to everybody else,” Proulx said.

The National Christmas Tree Association says U.S. consumers purchased 33 million farm-grown Christmas trees last year. About a third shopped at big-box stores, such as Wal-Mart or Home Depot; just over a quarter bought directly from farms; and just under a quarter purchased trees at retail lots. Internet sales accounted for less than 3 percent of total sales, though the association has heard anecdotal evidence that such purchases are increasing.

In northern New Hampshire, only about 500 of the roughly 11,000 trees sold by Mountain Star Farms in Haverhill go to online customers, but that number is growing, said manager Ben Hoyt. A 7-foot tree costs about $50, plus another $50 for shipping.

The trees are boxed and shipped within a day or two of being cut, said Hoyt. He reserves his very best trees for his online customers, who are encouraged to make general suggestions about size, shape and fullness when ordering.

“Christmas trees are such a personal and traditional thing that it’s really tough for people to relinquish that control over who picks out their Christmas tree for them, so the pressure on me is pretty extreme from time to time,” he said.

Jenny Thibault, 73, of Beverly, Massachusetts, said she used to be so picky about her Christmas tree that her family refused to shop with her. But when the nearby farm she liked closed, she took a chance and ordered a tree from Mountain Star Farms. That was about a decade ago, and she’s been a loyal customer ever since.

“The only thing I couldn’t do was smell it,” she said.