Jason Hupp, whose family operates Drakes Crossing Nursery and grows Christmas trees near Silverton, believes that tabletop trees should be grown on dedicated acreage and not interspersed with trees intended for the full-sized market.

CORBETT — Needing more Christmas trees than he had room to grow, Tom Norby hit upon an elegant solution: Plant them closer together.

As prices picked up after a severe market glut that hit the industry years before, much of the crop at his Trout Creek Tree Farm hadn’t yet reached a harvestable age.

Meanwhile, Norby lacked enough open ground on his 50 acres near Corbett to plant enough new trees to meet expected demand in the future.

“I couldn’t get trees into the ground fast enough to fill what was going to be a hole in my inventory,” he said.

Norby’s dilemma has been felt across the Christmas tree industry, which drastically reduced planting during an infamous episode of oversupply about a decade ago.

Near the height of the glut in 2009, farmers in Oregon, the U.S. industry’s top producer, planted about 5.5 million trees. That’s down 44% from five years earlier and roughly 1 million fewer trees than they sold, according to USDA.

As the surplus faded, growers didn’t have enough mature trees ready to sell, owing to the drop in plantings years earlier.

Shorter rotation

Producing smaller trees on a shorter rotation has helped alleviate the problem for farmers such as Norby.

Rather than endure a gap in production several years ago, he decided to plant the available open acreage at double the normal density.

While those trees couldn’t be grown to full size, they’d be ready to cut in less time and at least generate some income.

“You can harvest them a lot sooner than a large tree, was the thinking,” Norby said.

Nowadays, about 30% of Norby’s production is devoted to “tabletop” trees, which he sells to a regional chain store.

Not only are they more efficient to harvest, but they generate more money per acre despite having a smaller price tag, he said. Harvesting a larger number of trees on a shorter rotation more than makes up for the lower revenue per unit.

Tabletop trees generally sell for $10-$20 wholesale, roughly one-half to one-third the price of regular-sized trees, depending on species and height.

Norby and other growers have likewise found the diminutive specimens are popular among consumers with limited space and aching backs.

“You still get that feeling of having a live Christmas tree in the house,” Norby said.

The USDA doesn’t categorize Christmas tree sales by size, but anecdotally, the trend toward tabletop Christmas trees is on the upswing.

Trees shorter than 3 feet still represent a fraction of the overall market, but farmers say the niche has grown to a respectable size.

Traditionally, only about 500,000 tabletop trees were sold annually in the U.S., but in recent years that number has quadrupled to 2 million trees, or roughly 10% of the 20 million trees Americans buy annually, estimated Cubby Steinhart, co-owner of McKenzie Farms in Oregon City.

“It’s probably the fastest growing part of our industry,” he said, adding that demand for smaller trees began increasing about 15 years ago.

Estimates of annual Christmas tree sales vary widely. While the National Christmas Tree Association figures about 21 million trees are sold each year, the USDA pegs the number at fewer than 12 million worth $357 million.

‘Whole new market’

“We’ve opened up a whole new market who probably wouldn’t have a tree at all if it wasn’t for tabletops,” he said.

Tabletop trees have proven to be a good fit for children, convincing the Kirk Co. to develop “elf trees” with these young customers in mind.

“All my grandsons and granddaughters love having trees for their own bedroom,” said Gary Snyder, the Oregon City-based company’s owner.

Each tree is tagged with an “elf code” that conveys information about the elf who grew it on a special company website, teaching kids about the various aspects of Christmas tree production.

“It aligns with the jobs on the farm,” said Mike Jones, the company’s business manager.

Whether they end up in the hands of a child or an older consumer, elf trees are to provide centerpiece quality at a petite size, Jones said.

Elf trees are the cream of the tabletop crop, selected for their superior structure and proportion by workers specially trained for the role, he said. “They’ll come out and grade just for elf trees.”

The concept of these high-end tabletop “elf” trees has continued to prove successful since it was introduced more than a decade ago, Snyder said.

“From day one, it’s really done well,” he said.

Another variation

Some tabletop trees aren’t grown on traditional Christmas tree farms at all, but are repurposed nursery stock.

Bauman Farms sells live 3-foot-tall Christmas trees in decorative containers along with normally harvested ones at its farm stand near Gervais.

Rather than traditional fir varieties, most of the potted trees are golden cypresses, whose rapid growth allows for an economical $20 price tag.

According to USDA, 250 farms annually sell 350,000 live potted Christmas trees worth about $12.5 million.

Consumers can display such trees indoors only for a relatively short time without threatening their long-term survival, said Brian Bauman, the farm’s general manager.

“Live trees can’t stay in the house very long,” he said.

The shock of freezing outdoor temperatures can kill trees that have emerged from dormancy after more than a couple of weeks inside a warm home, Bauman said.

“All the sudden, that tree starts waking up,” he said.

Live potted trees should be acclimatized in a garage before being brought indoors or back outside, said Chal Landgren, Christmas tree specialist at Oregon State University.

Even then, the abrupt shift in conditions can be tricky.

“The difficulty of the live potted trees is it depends on the weather before and after,” Landgren said.

Kraemer’s Nursery near Mount Angel, began selling spruce and cypress species as live potted Christmas trees about eight years ago after customers requested them.

“We started small, and it’s grown into a decent little market,” said Barry Gregory, the nursery’s sales manager.

Potted spruces and cypresses are seldom a family’s main Christmas tree, instead serving as secondary decorations that ultimately get planted in the backyard, he said.

Kraemer’s Nursery sells the same species during the spring gardening season, but the trees offered at Christmas time aren’t just leftovers, Gregory said.

Trees are grown specifically for each season based on the forecast demand, as if they were different crops, he said. Decorative containers are used for Christmas-themed plants, some of which are also adorned with bows.

“It’s not an afterthought, it’s a planned effort,” Gregory said. “We sell more in spring than we do at Christmas, but it’s a nice little bonus at the end of the year.”