PENDLETON — Despite industry-wide supply chain issues, increased wholesale prices and more competition, local Christmas tree vendors reported they have plenty of tress, but prices at some lots are higher than in past seasons.

The Scouts BSA Christmas tree lot along Southwest Court Avenue in Pendleton on Saturday, Dec. 4, was able to get its full order of trees.

“We haven’t gotten much attention yet, but it’s picking up,” said Alexander Krokosz, senior patrol leader for the Pendleton Scouts BSA Troop 700.

“We were lucky that all the droughts and fires did not affect the trees we wanted,” Holly Krokosz said.

She is the troop’s committee chair and said the lot sources trees from the Mollala area each year. The troop used a donated truck to pick up their order of roughly 180 trees.

“We have regular folks that come through year after year,” she said.

The Scouts use the money raised through the sale of Christmas trees to help fund trips to summer camp and other excursions. Holly Krokosz said the troop wants to ensure any scout who wants to go to camp is able to afford to do so either at a reduced rate or for free.

The lot will run through Saturday, Dec. 11, stock permitting.

Hermiston lots see increased costs, prices

Mike Frink, the tree lot coordinator at the Hermiston Kiwanis Club tree lot, said Dec. 4, his lot had sold more than 100 of its 430 trees. The lot, in the parking lot of the Hermiston Community Center, has been selling trees since the late 1970s, Frink said.

In the early 1980s, when Frink was selling trees, they cost around $20 or $30. Now, they carry prices between $40 for a traditional Douglas Fir to $140 for a 10-foot tree. In this price range, there are a variety of types — Douglas fir, grand fir, noble fir and Nordmann fir.

Frink said the Nordmann trees are popular and new to the lot this year; there were only a dozen remaining Dec. 4.

The trees are from the Estacada area, and summer’s severe temperatures burned trees from bottom to the top, decreasing the crop. The Kiwanis Club had to search extra hard for trees, he said. Instead of obtaining trees from a single seller, like usual, the club had to buy from four different sellers.

Frink said the club paid around $10 more wholesale for each tree. Part of this increase was passed on to consumers, he said, which is why each tree is sold on the lot for $5 more than last year.

While the heat has troubled business, he said, the bigger challenge has been from competition with fake trees. In the early days of the lot, his club would sell 1,000 trees per year, well more than double the current sales. This was before fake trees were popular, he said.

Still, even with the challenges, Frink said the tree sale is a reliable fundraiser for the club. It is, he said, the second largest fundraiser for Kiwanis, typically earning $18,000.

“We appreciate that,” he said.

Money from the lot goes back into the community for causes such as Agape House, swimming safety lessons and Martha’s House, he said.

Up the street from the Kiwanis lot, in front of Grocery Outlet, Hermiston, George Ikonomou also sells Christmas trees. Having started the day before Thanksgiving, he said he expects to stay open through Dec. 20. On a good day, he said, he will sell 60 trees. His trees range from $10 to $99, and he carries Douglas fir, noble fir and Nordmann fir trees.

Like the Kiwanis sellers, Ikonomou also saw changes through the years. He first started selling trees around Hermiston 10 years ago. Since then, he also has noticed competition from fake trees, he said, and shortages in trees that predates the past year’s heat wave.

Because of the recent shortage, though, he had to buy in larger bulk than usual, he said. He stores about 600 trees now, bringing them out when needed. Ordinarily, he would be free to order trees when he started running low.

He is charging $10 more for each tree these days, he said, matching rising wholesale prices.

Still, he said, he likes this business, as it is work he can do with his brother, Demetri Ikonomou. In addition, he said he likes working around trees.

“I like real trees. They put me in the mood for Christmas,” he said.

Pendleton tree lots hold prices steady

Brothers Tom and Jeff Hepler, owners of Hepler’s Trees in Pendleton, said they held their prices the same this year and shifted around their stock to try to lessen the burden of increased wholesale costs.

“This year has been pretty good,” Tom Hepler said. “It’s a bit slow during the week but the weekends have been really busy.”

The Heplers said the lot has 550 trees, up from roughly 500 last year. He said he has a few more forest trees this year as opposed to his usual supply of farm grown trees.

“This year we got more of them,” he said. “But they’re big and beautiful.”

The lot plans to stay open as long as supply allows, and Tom Hepler said the brothers have a tradition of giving away the last tree of the year.

Ward Walker, owner of Walker’s Christmas Trees, said he has been able to keep his prices steady for more than a decade by cutting the trees himself in the Blue Mountains. Walker, who sources his trees from private land as well as a with a U.S. Forest Service permit, said he considers himself largely immune to supply chain issues.

“If it’s 10 days from Christmas and I need more trees, I’ll just go cut more trees,” he said.

Walker said he would rather sell additional trees than raise his prices, something his unique business strategy allows him to do.

While Walker hasn’t changed his business model, he said he has seen consumers change the way they shop in the last two years. Walker said he thinks the pandemic has made people want to get into the holiday spirit earlier in the year.

“Last year I thought I was on track to have an above average year,” he said. “I had sold like 80% of my trees before the 10th of December.”

Walker said he ended up still selling his usual 400 or so trees, despite the quick start, and added that he is seeing a similar trend this year.

Because he knows when and where his trees are cut, Walker said he guarantees his trees through Christmas and tries to stay open as late in the season as possible to ensure anyone who wants a tree is able to get one.

“A lot of folks think when the other lots run out that’s it, but I’ll still be here,” he said.

To further his mission of getting a tree to anyone who wants one, Walker has been collecting donations to help lessen the cost of trees for those who can’t afford them. As of Dec. 5, Walker had collected $415 to help families afford a tree, including roughly $120 he rolled over from last year. So far Walker has used about $160 of that to help people afford a tree or purchase a larger tree.

“I don’t want people to skip getting a tree,” he said, “just because of the cost.”