People may only buy Christmas trees four weeks out of the year, but it’s a full-time, year-round job for Steve Mannhard, who owns Fish River Trees in Summerdale.

The Christmas tree business is unique because for 11 months, Mannhard is a farmer. Then in late November, his farm turns into a retail store.

“(In November), You’ve got to crank up the telephone lines and make sure they’re working, you’ve got to get all this machinery working, you’ve got to get credit card machines working, you’ve got to get all these signs out and get everything ready for customers,” Mannhard said. “Then you’re a store, and in come the customers and the 20 employees to manage.”

The rest of the year, Mannhard usually works alone, running the farm like any other farmer would.

“It’s challenging from an agricultural aspect because it’s labor intensive. Here in this part of the South, they grow so fast that there’s no time off,” he said. “All year long from April all the way to November is a constant trimming process. It doesn’t get tough until the summer, and then in July, August and September it’s so humid that it’s awful. When I was younger I used to be able to handle it a lot better.”

Mannhard, 65, has been growing Christmas trees for 32 years.

In the 70s, Auburn’s Extension service began promoting Christmas trees as a cash crop for land that wasn’t suited for other row crops.

Mannhard was an English teacher at Foley High School, and he started growing trees as a part-time business to generate extra income.

“I loved it from the start, but then I was teaching school and in the Army Reserve, so I had three jobs, and all three of them were growing,” he said. “I enjoyed teaching a lot. It was a really tough call changing and doing this full time.”

Mannhard now only works on the farm, and he makes enough money during the Christmas season to support his family the rest of the year.

“I’ve made enough money to make a living, but unlike most people’s perception of this, it hasn’t been easy,” he said. “But it’s been enjoyable because it’s been my own little business. You control it, and you take it where you want to go with it.”

Fish River Trees consists of 40 acres, and there are usually 20,000 trees growing on the farm. Mannhard said he sells about 5,000 trees a year.

Unlike a typical farmer, one of the most important aspects of Mannhard’s job is providing good customer service. He said he does this by giving families an opportunity to make lasting traditions and memories at the farm.

The focus is more and more on children,” he said. “The event ends up being important to families and binding families together.”

Mannhard said he feels good knowing families use his farm as a way to grow closer.

“This is just one of many experiences that they can do with their children, but it’s a good example of what parents should be doing with their children — getting them out of their home and away from the games and TVs and getting out and doing different types of things as a family,” Mannhard said. “You see them interacting with each other, and the kids are having a ball.”

For the past 32 years, Mannhard has observed trends in the industry. Christmas seems to get earlier and earlier every year, he said.

“What has happened to the Christmas tree industry is it’s reacting to the retail industry, and as the retail industry is going earlier and earlier, here come these customers thinking Christmas at Thanksgiving,” he said. “When we were kids, we’d set that tree up the week before Christmas at best, maybe even Christmas Eve. Now, nobody will buy their Christmas tree that weekend before Christmas. We might sell 25 or 50 trees, as opposed to Thanksgiving, more like 1,000.”

The length of time people want to have Christmas trees in their homes has led to an expectation for trees to last longer, which in turn has caused an increase in the number of artificial trees, which Mannhard, of course, disapproves of.

“We don’t even begin to understand how somebody could buy a fake tree,” he said. “There’s zero tradition there. There’s no value to the American economy in that. It’s all an overseas manufactured product. It’s not benefitting our agricultural community. And it’s a non-renewable, non-biodegradable product.”

Mannhard said buying a real Christmas tree is not only a tradition he believes families should embrace, but it also boosts the local economy.

“Even this little business — there’s 20 employees here, and all that money stays in the community,” he said. “I buy all of my materials for this farm here in Baldwin County. My equipment comes from Foley and Robertsdale.”

Although the industry has evolved and changed countless times, one thing has stayed the same all 32 years, and that’s the enjoyment Mannhard gets from interacting with his customers.

“The best thing about this business is the customers,” he said. “We have got to have the best set of customers that any business could possibly ask for.”