Albertans encouraged to shop early as Christmas tree shortage looms

CALGARY -

A looming shortage of Christmas trees has suppliers advising people to shop early and temper their expectations.

It's a problem years in the making, stemming back to the recession of 2008-2011. It's been exacerbated by current supply chain issues and extreme weather events, and a spike in demand for real trees at Christmas.

"The demand has increased so much over the last five years that we couldn't have forecasted that we were going to grow as an industry so much," said Shirley Brennan, executive director of the Canadian Christmas Tree Growers Association.  "We're asking people that if you typically get that nice eight-foot Fraser Fir, that you might look at different fir trees, or look at different species."

Inside the tree lot at Golden Acres Home and Garden there are hundreds of trees lined up and ready to sell.

Marketing director Colin Hayles said while it may look like a lot of trees, they won’t last long.

"These can move really fast, and what we're finding is with the shortages in B.C., on top of the disaster they just had with the roads, a lot of people are finding it very difficult to get any kind of extras," said Hayles. "We're working really hard to secure some, we should have some more arriving this week. But a lot of it is just you know, gruelling."

Hayles points out that while many trees still come from eastern Canada almost all live garland and wreaths come from British Columbia, in the areas hardest-hit by summer heatwaves and current floods.

B.C. tree farmer Albert Loewen said 2020 was a bad year, but 2021 has shaped up to be the worst Christmas tree season he can remember. He pointed to Pine Meadows Christmas Tree farm in Chilliwack, where 15,000 trees are presently underwater.

Loewen added that the damaged roads and rail lines pose an even larger threat to the seasonal tree business, saying "the last couple of days we have been cutting and bailing trees. They get hauled to our main yard where we do the shipping and right now we have a few thousand sitting there waiting to be shipped."

At Calgary’s Plantation Garden Centre owner Colin Atter is waiting for his shipments of trees. He was expecting them last week. They are now set to arrive in two separate deliveries this week. Those will be the last of the trees the centre in northwest Calgary receives this year.

"We were supposed to have our trees a week ago, and, you know, numerous phone calls to my freight broker and she's like, there's no room on the train," said Atter  "After that was resolved, they had trouble finding empty containers to get to the farm to fill (with trees)."

Brennan said Christmas tree farms work on a 10-year cycle, so most trees in the lots in 2021 were planted in 2011. Because of the lag time between planting and harvest, tree famers cannot react quickly to spikes in demand, as have been seen in the past five years.

"It's something that is short term, but it is going to be short term for a couple of years. So, it's not going to be over this year," said Brennan. "We are doing everything we can, we just can't make trees grow fast."

Brennan said the summer heat dome that locked in over British Columbia this summer caused widespread damage to many tree farms, and the current floods, and subsequent supply chain delays are also hampering efforts to bring trees to market.

"We have tree farms right in that area where the flooding is, and their concern is, how are they going to get our pre-cut trees out.  Some of the issue is they've already been cut so they're already on pallets ready to go and they can't get them out.  They can't get them out of the water," said Brennan. "The other issue is, how are we going to get them out? Or rather how are we going to get people to our farms in B.C. in the flooding area? So we certainly are concerned."

Transportation issues, including a shortage of truck drivers, are also hampering delivery of trees from eastern Canada.  The compounding supply issues for this year's Christmas tree supply may have many consumers buying trees early. For those people ,Brennan offers this advice on keeping the tree healthy through the Christmas season:

"You don't have to put it up right away. Keep it in a cool damp place, keep it wrapped from the elements. So if you're leaving it outside, just make sure it's wrapped, so that the wind and the sun doesn't dry it out. Then when you bring it in, make a fresh cut and put plenty of water in so that it drinks it in (and) it'll be healthy."

The shortages, and especially the rising cost of container shipping will also drive up the costs. Tree lot owners say they are seeing massive jumps in the province they pay for delivered trees.

"Everything has gone up. So (we're experiencing a) little bit of sticker shock. It's nothing anybody can do," said Atter. "Freight costs double what it used to. Labor is hard to get if they can even get it. So costs have gone up, up, up. I'd say in the past, in the past five years, cost has gone up by 30, 40 per cent on a tree."

Those who wait too long may end up with a  'Charlie Brown tree' but Brennan said, as that Christmas classic points out, the true meaning of Christmas is not found in the size of the tree.

"A Charlie Brown tree in your eyes, is the perfect Christmas tree in my eyes. So it's always beauty is in the eye of the beholder."