Whitney

It all began when I was wrestling with my cousin Bobby during Thanksgiving at my grandparents’ house in 1974 when I was eight years old.

“Why do you smell like trees?” I asked Bobby. He then proceeded to explain that he had been making money collecting “tips” from trees and selling them to Flo, the owner of Flo’s Wreaths in Marshfield, Maine.

Since my mother wouldn’t buy me candy, I thought that this was the PERFECT solution to my candy crisis.

When I got home I grabbed a sandwich bag, climbed a spruce tree and started picking the needles off. Upon arrival at Flo’s, I proudly held up my bag full of spruce needles and declared: “I have some tips to sell!”

She was humored by my naivety. She then showed me into the tip shed where the smell of fresh balsam fir overwhelmed my senses. I surveyed the many heaps of small branches and realized these must be “tips.”

She then opened the door into the wreath room where I saw several women working at tables, snapping the tips into decorative little bunches and wrapping them with wire around a ring to create wreaths. Flo unknowingly had opened the door to my new world.

I knew right then and there that this is what I wanted to do.

As I reflect back, Flo patiently took the time to explain her craft to me.  Neither of us knew at the time, but these were the first steps towards building a business now known as Whitney Wreath.

I started as an eight-year-old boy simply wanting to earn money for candy. But now it’s a source of livelihood and joy for more people than I could have ever imagined.