Operational Overview
This is a container based tree farm: Everything is done in pots. Tree size ranges from seedling to 2 inch caliper. The farm has been growing steadily for the last 9 years, even while the economy has tanked. Remember the crunch in 2008? We grew. The crunch when oil dropped to 40 bucks a barrel? We grew, just not much. It is ready for the next step up. We've had a cash flow of just under 80 thousand dollars the last two years. In 2017, we hit 80,000 on the first of June.
We buy seedlings that are surplus from reforestation and reclamation projects. Some we sell. We plant the rest in pots, and water them for a year or two.
Some we sell. The reminder move to a larger pot. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Overall it’s not worth growing ourselves unless we do about 300 a year. So for fruit trees and selected ornamentals we buy them from wholesale nurseries, and resell them. Left over stock moves up a pot size.
Clientele
Our market is largely farm and acreage owners, with some city customers, and a few out of province clients. We have specialized in smaller trees. Seedlings have grown in popularity, possibly due to the economy, but I think mostly because more people are attempting bigger projects.
Current market niches
- Seedlings. Last year we bought 14,000 seedlings, and sold half of them within weeks. The remainder we planted into larger containers. We are sending trees all over Alberta, and a few deliveries each year into Saskatchewan and B.C. This year we have ordered 19,000. In this niche our chief competitor is Tree Time, and The Saskatoon Farm. Currently 15-20% of our annual sales.
- Shelterbelt Trees. The typical customer has an acreage or farm and wants to put at least one row of trees between themselves and the wind. Most of this size is sold as one or two gallon pots. This is our main bread and butter niche. We grow about 2/3 of these from scratch.
- Privacy screening. A good deal of overlap with the shelterbelt market, but with more emphasis on smaller, narrower trees. This niche has been growing steadily. The largest demand here is for trees already taller than the fence.
- Edible landscaping. Currently about 15% of our total sales. We do not know of any nursery that carries a larger selection of fruit trees and fruit shrubs. We work with the local permaculture people in this, and often are their supplier of choice.
- Reclamation and naturalization. Mostly native trees and shrubs, often at small sizes. Sold mostly to contractors reclaiming drilling sites, and municipalities making low maintenance corridors. This area at present is wildly variable, as individual contracts tend to be infrequent, but large.
Lodgepole Pine in our front yard.
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Sherwood's Forests is located about 75 km southwest of Edmonton, Alberta. Please refer to the map on our Contact page for directions.