FedEx and Christmas SPIRIT Foundation Celebrate Landmark Milestone: Delivering the 300,000th Tree to Military Families This Season
This year, FedEx Freight delivered the 300,000th tree for the Christmas SPIRIT Foundation’s annual Trees for Troops program. The milestone tree was presented at Fort Liberty in North Carolina on December 1, 2023. Altogether, 16,502 trees were delivered to 94 bases across 6 branches of service and one National Guard Training Center. This program starts at our Christmas tree farm, with a total of 300 farms from 26 states providing trees, donated directly by them or their customers and local sponsors.
In North Carolina, 41 farms and individuals donated a total of 1, 182 trees that went to 3 bases: Camp LeJeune, NC, Fort Sill, OK, and Naval Air Station Joint Reserve Base, LA.
There were 56 loading stations for the trees, with two official North Carolina sites at the Upper Mountain Research Station in Laurel Springs and the NC Cooperative Extension Service Avery County Office in Newland. It takes a lot of work to gather and tag the trees and manage a loading event on a designated day. We rely on FFA and ROTC students from Ashe, Alleghany and Avery County to help load the trees. Local schools help fill out tags sending personal greetings to service families on each tree.
Thanks to everyone who donated their time and trees this year!
THANK YOU TO THE FOLLOWING GROWERS:
Appalachian Evergreens
Avery Farms
Barr Evergreens
Bottomleys Evergreens
Bruner Sides Nursery
Buck Hill Tree Farm
Buck Knob Farm
Buck’s Tree Farm
C and J Christmas Trees
Cartner Christmas Tree Farm
Christmas Tree Hill Nursery
Clawson’s Christmas Trees
Cline Church Nursery
Cornett Carolina Trees
Cornett Deal Christmas Tree Farm
Cullowhee Valley Christmas Trees Inc.
D&J Trees
C&G Nursery
Fir Ridge Christmas Tree Farm
Happy Holiday Christmas Trees
Kathy Shore Nursery
Mistletoe Meadows
Peak Farms
Pressley Tree Farm
Smokey Holler Tree Farm
Lil’ Grandfather Choose & Cut
Snow Creek Christmas Trees
Stone Mountain Farms
Wind Dog Farm
Windy Gap Tree Farm
Wishon Evergreens
Wolf Creek Tree Farm & Nursery
Special Thanks to the Following Donors:
Chick fil A Boone
Ag South Farm Credit
Ashe County FFA && ROTC
Avery County ROTC
Hardees of Newland
Tracy Taylor & Staff, Upper Mountain Research Station
Jerry Moody & Staff, Avery County Cooperative Extension
Smokey Holler Tree Farm
Brad Edwards
Dee Clark
Will Christianson
