There are a dozen species sold as Christmas trees in America. We sell mostly one.
That is not laziness. A New York apartment is a specific and fairly brutal environment for a cut tree, and one species handles it better than the rest.
The apartment problem
A tree in a heated NYC apartment is dealing with radiator heat it cannot escape, air that is drier than the mountainside it grew on, and about four weeks of standing time. On top of that it has to survive a stairwell, hold ornaments that in some families are older than the building, and not drop half of itself on the floor by December 20.
That narrows the field fast.
Fraser fir, and why it wins here
Needle retention. Fraser fir holds its needles longer than almost anything else sold, which is the whole ballgame in a heated apartment. Watered daily, a Fraser stays green and holding well past Christmas.
Branch strength. Fraser branches are stiff and angle slightly upward. They hold heavy ornaments without sagging, and they leave gaps between the tiers so ornaments hang in air instead of getting swallowed. If you have glass ornaments from your grandmother, this is the tree.
The smell. Fraser has the scent people mean when they say a Christmas tree smells like Christmas. In a 600 square foot apartment, that fills the whole place.
The shape. Naturally conical, dense, with a good spire on top. It looks like the tree in the drawing.
The other species, honestly
Douglas fir. Softer needles, sweet smell, cheaper. Branches are more flexible, so heavy ornaments pull them down. Fine tree, wrong tree for a heavy-ornament family.
Balsam fir. The best smell of the lot, genuinely. Drops needles faster in dry heat, and it is a looser, more open shape. Great in a cold house, harder in a steam-heated apartment.
Canaan fir. Close cousin to Fraser, similar look and retention. We sell a few. Supply is thinner and quality is less consistent year to year.
Spruce, blue or Norway. Beautiful color on the blue. Sharp needles that will make you regret decorating in a t-shirt, and Norway spruce in particular drops early indoors.
Pine. Long soft needles, very good retention, but the needle length makes ornaments sit oddly. We use white pine for garland, where those long soft needles are exactly right.
Where ours come from
We do not order our trees off a list. Joseph and Ed drive south every November and pick them up at family farms in North Carolina, with Maryland and Pennsylvania for the tall ones, then haul them back to Manhattan themselves.
That is why the trees at our stand were on a mountain days earlier and not weeks earlier. Freshness at the point of sale is not marketing language, it is a driving schedule.
The one thing that matters more than species
Water. Every day, without missing one.
Any species, cut fresh, will outlast a Fraser that went dry in week two. We wrote the whole thing up here: how to care for your Christmas tree and keep it fresh all season.
Come look at them
Species arguments end the moment you are standing in front of a hundred trees. We are at St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, 131 E 10th Street at 2nd Avenue, from November 21 through Christmas Eve.
Or shop online and we will pick one for you, which is a thing we are good at.