Biggest weekend for buying Christmas trees, tree farms planning ahead for next year

WEBSTER, N.Y. (WHEC) — Chopping down next year’s Christmas tree might be harder than this year.

A pandemic-related issue has tree farms already planning the next few years. This is the biggest weekend of the year for people to buy their Christmas trees.

Wilbert’s Tree Farm in Webster has over 100 acres of trees, but they’re already thinking ahead to next year with the anticipation it might look a little different.

"Seedlings for next year are going to be tough to find, so we’re trying to make commitments for two years out already,” said Timothy Wilbert, the general manager.

Wilbert says this year supply is meeting demand, and it usually does, but that might not be the case next year. Wilbert says nationwide shortages is making its rounds, and his line of work is next.

"From that nursery end definitely correlated with the pandemic, we’ve never has issues getting seedlings like we have this year," Wilbert said.

Dozens of people took the adventure to cut down their own trees.

"Actually it was easy, it was my husband’s first time cutting a tree and he was like wow that wasn’t hard at all,” one family told us.

People searching for the perfect tree were socially distancing from each other. People News10NBC spoke to say the community is still learning how to live in a pandemic world, and with a new variant on the rise, it’s reassuring to see people still out in public.

"I feel like this is the type of environment to promote no mask, especially with COVID still being ramped up because you can still have your distance from people and trust that or hope that you’re not going to get anything but be social at the same time,” another family told us.