Holy moly! How are the years passing SO quickly? Seems like we JUST did this! Right!?!
The good news is Covid is less of an issue this year. Thank goodness! If you wish to wear a mask, you are certainly welcome to do so but none will be required, even in the barn. We’ll continue to have our employees who are in close contact with customers sit behind plexiglass. Heck – we bought the stuff and it does protect us from the colds and flu germs that are still circulating.
For the ‘Twitter crowd’, let me summarize what we’re doing this year in a few sentences. If you don’t understand or want more details, read the rest of the newsletter.
The long version…
The Trees
We were hoping for a more ‘normal’ summer this year but that didn’t happen – or maybe this is our ‘new normal’. The market trees did surprisingly well but the seedlings had a tough time. Mike bought extra seedlings to make up for last year’s losses. This didn’t work out so well but the impact won’t be seen for years.
Doug Firs – These are native so it shouldn’t be a surprise that they thrived. They are looking really nice. However, Mike has been planting more seedlings than we’ve been selling for several years so we have excess stock, especially of the larger trees. Mike can’t climb the ladder to trim them anymore so they have to go. We’ll be having a DOUG FIR SALE! Any Doug Fir will be a flat $50 charge – any size.
Grand Firs – The Grands grew surprisingly well this year – maybe the cool, wet spring was to their liking. There are a LOT of gorgeous Grands out there to choose from. Grands are also the most fragrant of the trees so they’re really hard to beat.
Fraser Firs – The Frasers are native to SC where they get summer rain so they’re not really liking the droughty summers we’ve been having. We’re rethinking where we plant them but that’s not going to help for a while. We still have a good supply of beautiful larger trees for this year. Going forward, hard to tell.
Noble Firs – The Nobles found something to love this year. Wish we knew what exactly so we could repeat it! They have lush growth and incredible color. Who knew??
Nordmann Firs – Some of the upcoming Nordmann babies are getting into the 7-8’ range this year. There’s very little above that size. What’s there looks fantastic – they didn’t miss a beat with the crazy weather. There just aren’t many of them.
Thanks for reading this to the end! In this short-message Twitter-era, we know what a challenge that is.
Stay safe. We’ll see you soon!
Mike and Sheila
Lochsloy Acres
The good news is Covid is less of an issue this year. Thank goodness! If you wish to wear a mask, you are certainly welcome to do so but none will be required, even in the barn. We’ll continue to have our employees who are in close contact with customers sit behind plexiglass. Heck – we bought the stuff and it does protect us from the colds and flu germs that are still circulating.
For the ‘Twitter crowd’, let me summarize what we’re doing this year in a few sentences. If you don’t understand or want more details, read the rest of the newsletter.
- Appointments will be required except the last weekend – this is our ‘new normal’ to keep the crowding and unsafe road conditions to a minimum. Here’s the link: Note – Android devices don’t work properly. Use a real computer to schedule your computer.
- Appointment Scheduler
- When you schedule your appointment, we have 3 questions to help us manage our process – the number of vehicles you are bringing, the number of trees you want, and “What are you doing today?”.
- Trees can ONLY be reserved between Nov 5th and Nov. 14th. After that, it’s ‘choose and cut’ only, i.e. find your tree and take it home.
- Remember - If you reserve your tree, be SURE to schedule a second appointment to come back and cut it!
- Dec 9-11th will be Open Farm (appointments are optional). If the lot fills up, we’ll close it except for those people with appointments.
- We are a U-Cut farm. Don’t assume we will cut your tree for you. We will if we can but staffing issues limit what we can do.
- NO TRAILERS! If you show up with one, you may be turned away if neither of the 2 trailer parking spots are open. (BTW – if you decide to bring a trailer anyway, make SURE you are able to back it with precision.)
- No Pets Allowed!
- No Photographers!
The long version…
- Dates of operation: We will be open from Nov 5th – Dec 11th. Appointments will be optional the last weekend (we’re trying this.) If the lot fills up, only people with appointments will be allowed in.
- Tree Reservations - We will be limiting the dates for tree reservations again. We need time between the closing of reservations and opening of Choose and Cut to make sure all our records match what’s in the field. We will allow trees to be reserved ONLY until Nov 14th. No exceptions!!
- Appointment Scheduler –The link for the scheduler is at the top of this email and will also be on the web site starting Oct 8th.
- The scheduler looks different from past years. Each date has its own ‘page’, accessible via tabs across the top of the screen.
- By setting it up this way, we can use a feature that allows us to keep signups open until 8pm the night before. We’re hoping this will cut down on email and phone change requests. We’ll see…
- As the season progresses, the schedule hours and slots may change.
- Your answers to the “How many trees?” question will allow us to monitor sales versus our goal. If we get close to our goal, we may reduce unscheduled appointment slots to avoid overselling.
- Employee scheduling may also affect the appointments. If we don’t have enough employees, we’ll have to cut back unscheduled slots. We will honor all existing sign-ups, even if it’s just Mike and Sheila working.
- Important to remember - IF YOU CAN BOOK AN APPOINTMENT, YOU CAN GET A TREE, even if it’s on the last day.
- Your response in the Quantity box on the scheduler indicates how many vehicles you are bringing to your appointment (not people). The scheduler will monitor how many vehicles are signed up in each time slot and close the slot when it’s full. This avoids parking lot congestion problems.
- We’ve added a question for you to tell us what you’re doing, e.g. Reserve a tree, Choose and Cut, etc. This helps us anticipate the needs of the day. If you’d like us to cut your reserved tree, this should be indicated on the pick-up date, NOT the reservation date.
- If you schedule a date to reserve a tree, be SURE to schedule a second date to cut it, even if you’re going to ask us to do the cutting.
- We’ve allowed you to choose up to 4 trees with each appointment. If you need more than that (e.g. need 8 for church decorations), select 4 trees and add a note in comments, e.g. ‘Cutting 8 trees total’.
- Appointments are scheduled every 15 minutes to spread out arrivals so there’s no dangerous backup on the highway. Each appointment assumes roughly 1-1.5 hours to find your tree. No tailgating please – we need the parking spaces to turn over frequently to make the appointments work.
- PLEASE – if you need to change your appointment, access or delete the old one using the link on your confirmation email. We have no ‘look up’ function and have to ‘eye-ball’ all the signups to find you. Our eyes aren’t that great anymore!
- If you have questions, please ask. We respond promptly to emails.
- The scheduler looks different from past years. Each date has its own ‘page’, accessible via tabs across the top of the screen.
- Trailers – We have no way to manage trailer scheduling and can’t guarantee you’ll be able to park or even turn around in our lot if you bring one. Add to that the number of people we’ve had who can’t back their trailers up and you see the potential for disaster on a busy day. If you MUST bring a trailer, we’d recommend scheduling your appointment on a non-holiday weekday when the parking lot isn’t as busy.
- Barn Interior. We are keeping the flow we established during Covid to reduce congestion and provide one-way movement. Watch for the signage.
- At this time, we do not plan to offer hot chocolate in the barn – we don’t have the employees to staff it. There’s an Espresso stand ¼ mile away toward Granite Falls.
- Gloves. No loaner gloves this year. Please remember to bring your own gloves. Regular garden gloves will be fine to keep the dirt and tree pitch off your hands.
- Bow saws. These will be available as usual. You may also bring your own bow saw, reciprocating saw or electric chainsaw. For safety reasons, gas powered chainsaws are not allowed, as usual.
- Wreaths. We plan to have wreaths on display in the barn for purchase. We will take orders during the first two weekends (during tree reservations). You can also send us an email if you want something special (e.g. candy cane, large wreath).
- Note – we will only have the wreaths we can make on the farm. Many of the decorations we normally order come from China and aren’t available this year. I’m not ordering supplemental wreaths only to find I can’t decorate them!
- Cutting Assistance – This falls into two categories – planned and unplanned.
- “Planned” cutting requests are people who reserved a tree and asked us to cut it for them at a later date. With our “3 days off” schedule, we were able to cut the following weekend’s cut schedule during our closed days. This has vastly improved our ability to accommodate cutting requests.
- “Unplanned” cutting requests happen when a customer finds a tree and wants us to go cut it on the spot. We have limited ability to do that. If someone is clearly disabled, older than us, or 14 months pregnant, we’ll try to help them when we can get to it. Otherwise, please plan to get your hands dirty.
- Tree Prices – It’s been several years since we’ve changed our prices. Things were fairly stable so we didn’t see the need. As you may well expect, that has changed this year in a big way. We’re still working out what the prices will be this year but, rest assured, they’ll be higher.
The Trees
We were hoping for a more ‘normal’ summer this year but that didn’t happen – or maybe this is our ‘new normal’. The market trees did surprisingly well but the seedlings had a tough time. Mike bought extra seedlings to make up for last year’s losses. This didn’t work out so well but the impact won’t be seen for years.
Doug Firs – These are native so it shouldn’t be a surprise that they thrived. They are looking really nice. However, Mike has been planting more seedlings than we’ve been selling for several years so we have excess stock, especially of the larger trees. Mike can’t climb the ladder to trim them anymore so they have to go. We’ll be having a DOUG FIR SALE! Any Doug Fir will be a flat $50 charge – any size.
Grand Firs – The Grands grew surprisingly well this year – maybe the cool, wet spring was to their liking. There are a LOT of gorgeous Grands out there to choose from. Grands are also the most fragrant of the trees so they’re really hard to beat.
Fraser Firs – The Frasers are native to SC where they get summer rain so they’re not really liking the droughty summers we’ve been having. We’re rethinking where we plant them but that’s not going to help for a while. We still have a good supply of beautiful larger trees for this year. Going forward, hard to tell.
Noble Firs – The Nobles found something to love this year. Wish we knew what exactly so we could repeat it! They have lush growth and incredible color. Who knew??
Nordmann Firs – Some of the upcoming Nordmann babies are getting into the 7-8’ range this year. There’s very little above that size. What’s there looks fantastic – they didn’t miss a beat with the crazy weather. There just aren’t many of them.
Thanks for reading this to the end! In this short-message Twitter-era, we know what a challenge that is.
Stay safe. We’ll see you soon!
Mike and Sheila
Lochsloy Acres
.
There's a Christmas tree in there somewhere!!
Lochsloy Acres Tree Farm
425-308-0355
5511 State Road 92
Lake Stevens, WA 98258
LochsloyAcres@live.com
Member of Puget Sound Christmas Tree Association
http://www.pscta.org
