Rental & adoption Christmas trees: delivered, picked up & replanted

For all the traditional merriment they embody, Christmas trees are a) awkward to transport and b) terribly depressing when they’re discarded in January. No longer if Los Angeles landscape architect Scott Martin has his way; he founded The Living Christmas Company, which gives Los Angeles residents the chance to temporarily rent a living Christmas tree and have it delivered right to their door. Unlike regular Christmas trees, around 20 million of which are felled each year in the US, living trees are transplanted, roots and all, into pots to be enjoyed over the festive period. After the holidays, Scott and his team pick up the trees, replant them and nuture them until next year. Customers can order a living tree from the company’s website; sizes range from 3–8 feet and prices—including delivery and collection by bio-diesel truck—are comparable to those of felled trees. While the company isn’t the first to offer tree rentals for Christmas, it is the first we’ve seen that lets customers adopt a pine, allowing them to share Christmas with the same tree year after year, watching it grow along with their family. Adopted trees are tracked by barcode. The concept will certainly appeal to eco-conscious Angelenos, who may not get a white Christmas, but can now choose a greener one. It also gives them a nice little cradle-to-cradle status story to share at Christmas. Mr Martin goes by the nickname Scotty Claus. However, until he has a distribution network to match that of his namesake, there’s an opportunity for green-fingered, red-suited entrepreneurs elsewhere… (Related: Trees with character, felled to order.)