Today, I volunteered a few hours of my time at a church Christmas tree lot near my house. I helped carry trees, load them on cars, saw off any branches near the nase, and drill holes in the bottoms for the tree stands. While I wasn't expecting to get anything out of it, I actually learned a LOT and saw what people are looking for this holiday season and a little about upsells. The biggest thing I noticed was the "accessories" being sold. Tree stands, wreaths, ornaments, and tree "self-watering" units were being sold like hot cakes. This really surprised me, and believe it or not, the markup was fantastic. Wreaths were purchased from the christmas tree supplier and sold to the tree lot for about $5 each, we had about 200 of them and sold them all in under 4 hours for about $15 each (The supplier gave basic wreaths, we "dressed" them up for extra holiday appeal.) Another thing I noticed was the potential for your own wreath selling. I noticed that when customers are getting their tree, they request certain branches to be cut off, usually near the base so their tree can fit into the stand. These branches are tossed aside, and the man who hauls them away charges a ton. What I did was to grab the extra evergreen branches and took them with me. I have found that every tree lot I've visited doesn't mind if you take the discarded branches, but be sure to check first! There are tutorials all over the web on how to create a Christmas wreath, and you could either sell these wreaths door to door to people in the community or to local businesses (businesses spend more during holidays!), or cut a deal with tree lots with a 50/50 or 60/40 split for each sold, or a flat rate for all if possible. I was able to make a pretty fancy wreath (evergreen branches, ribbons, glitter, bows, small bells) for under $2~3 and in less than 20 minutes, and if you have kids looking for something to do, this would be perfect! Hope these money-making ideas helped you out during this holiday season, there's plenty of opportunity out there because we all know people spend more money during the holidays. If this helped you out in any way, I'd appreciate taking the time to "thank" me, it helps give me an idea of exactly who I helped and gives me an incentive to share more fresh content with you. This also took me a while to write Take care guys! -tech
