The trend of shopping at local and small businesses has garnered some attention recently, but we have been doing it at Planters’ Choice for years.
We cleared land for more production space in both Watertown and Newtown last fall, and had some logs that were ideally suited for hardwood lumber. So we called the local lumber mill in Bethel (another multi-generational family business) and had the wood milled to our specifications.
The Oak used on the trailer was from our new perennial area in Watertown and is staying there. The trailer will be used to move trees out of our fields to areas for either holding above ground or loaded to go to a sales yard or directly to our customers. Thanks to Darren for putting on the decking and for coming up with the idea of using hinges so the short sides can be easily lowered when loading or unloading.
The Maple and Ash were below our machinery barn in Newtown, and have been used to build pallets that we use to pull orders and move plants around. Greg and Danny worked hard at putting them together, admittedly made a bit easier because the wood was still green (any of you have tried to fasten into dried hardwood can relate). On a side note, I asked for a few pieces of slabwood (generally discarded because they’re the scrap that has bark on them and is cut to square the wood) so I could build my son a sandbox.
Turns out we can not only feel good about doing things this way because it’s responsible, we wound up saving a bit over purchasing the material. Thanks for taking the time to read about the life of these trees!

Best,
Darryl