In the United States, places like North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania and Michigan develop the most Christmas trees, but they might be losing consumers because of a lack of Christmas trees. North Carolina is a major grower and exporter of Christmas trees for the United States, but due to the recession of 2008, the tree supply went down. Tree growers are recommending that people go out and buy trees early for the holidays because there is a shortage.

The recession of 2008 hit businesses hard when the Lehman Brothers went bankrupt. The Lehman brothers were America’s fourth largest investment bank and when they went bankrupt it started a downtrum of events. The bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers was the largest in U.S. history.  America lost 7.5 million jobs and homes shed $16 trillion of net worth in that year alone. During this time growers did not have many seeds to plant on the land they had.

“We have our own farm so we didn’t have to adjust prices because of the shortage, we actually planted trees even though the sales were down,” said Tommy Wagoner, farmer for Wagoners Christmas trees.

Christmas trees take about 7-10 years to grow to full maturity, which is about eight feet. Tree growers have to plan for the future, which is why there is a low supply of trees. The low quantity of trees is hiking up the price 5-10% of the original prices of trees. The tree demand is increasing which is causing the price to increase and supply to decrease.

The industry wants consumers to be patient this Christmas. Tree growers are worried that they will not have enough good trees. The variety this year will be harsh because the recession caused the quality to go down. Picking out a tree this year with families might be a little hard to find the perfect one. Some tree companies will be losing business this year because of the impact.

“It’s a tradition of my family and we’ve done it ever since I was a little girl,” said Alyssa Bartholomew, freshman.

 North Carolina is the second largest grower and produces about 20% of Christmas trees for America. Since there was low demand for trees North Carolina decided they would plant less. North Carolina Christmas Tree Association noted that the states official tree, Fraser fir, has a very limited supply this year. Tree growers wish they had planted more back in 2008.

“I buy real trees because they smell like real trees and the real ones are more genuine and Christmas-y,” said Will Wakeford, freshman.