Saturday, November 26, 2016

Christmas Tree Sale

Thanksgiving day each year TLC begins one of its major fundraising efforts. That's the day we open our Christmas tree lots in various areas of the Valley. Each lot is staffed by TLC clients, all volunteers who spend their own time on the project. Funds raised during the month-long sale goes to charity and Christmas bonuses for various clients and staff members who put the project together.

It might not sound like a big deal to put together Christmas tree lots. But there are a lot of details that go into this project.

First, around the middle of July a staff member starts looking for places to sell trees. So, you might ask what's the big deal about that? Well, one of the problems is that not everyone wants Christmas tree sales on their property.

Each time we find a location it must meet certain qualifications. It must be on a corner where there's a lot of traffic. The owner of the property must agree to allow us there, which means we need to get liability insurance coverage for the location. There must also be a water supply to keep the trees fresh and moist.

And this year we ran into a problem we hadn't encountered for some time: none of the suppliers where we buy our trees in Oregon had any available. Fortunately, at the last moment, we were able to locate someone who had 1000 trees for sale.

Some of our biggest benefactors over the years have been Walmart stores.

For those of you who would like to buy a tree this year we have lots at the following locations:

  • The Target store at I -17 and Beardsley,
  • Walmart at Alma School and Warner·
  • Walmart at Greenfield and I – 60
  • Chris town Mall

We are grateful to all of those who allow us to sell on their property.


Click here to email John