Selling trees in the Big Apple

>> In New York at Christmas, street-savvy Quebecers make big money playing the backwoodsman

by KURT CHABOYER

The thought of Christmas time in New York City puts lots of familiar pictures in one's head: skating at Rockefeller Center beneath the massive Christmas tree, shopping at Macy's, people buying trees for their cramped apartments from streetcorner tree vendors.

And if you approach any streetside tree stand in New York today, you will almost certainly be greeted by a vendor with a thick Québécois accent. Christmas trees are big business and one man, Kevin Hammer, a fast-talking Scientologist, has been building his own untaxed, cash-only Christmas tree empire. He gets his trees from across North America, and most of his treesellers from Quebec.

The sellers brave the cold for 16 hours a day, every day from Dec. 1 to Christmas Eve. They sleep in vans on the street and cut deals with local merchants and residents for use of
electricity, bathrooms and showers.

Catherine, 27, and Brigitte (who goes by the nickname Bill), 28, are two francophones who have come down from Montreal to take in their share of this cash in the heart of the posh Upper East Side. This is their third year in a row selling trees. Over four weeks, they will make thousands of dollars--enough to spend the winter in a warm climate and still have money left over.

In an area where uniformed doormen stand in the lobbies of apartment buildings while the homeless linger on the sidewalks outside, Bill and Catherine need to maintain good relations with everyone. They hand out doggie treats to the trophy dogs, who are invariably attracted to the trees. In this way they meet and charm the owners or the professional dog-walkers who parade them by. They regularly receive gifts--from coffee to bottles of whiskey to a thermos--from local street-dwellers.

"The homeless people think we are just the same as them because we live and work on the street," says Catherine. One of their regular homeless visitors is sleeping in the trees at the back of the stand, his two fully-packed shopping carts nearby. She takes a picture of him. "He said to us, 'When I wake up I feel like I'm in a forest.'"

Despite the picturesque urban scenes, New Yorkers still drive a hard bargain. Farther south, near the World Trade Center, a woman pulls her Jeep onto the sidewalk and approaches David at his stand. "I learned to bargain in Turkey," she tells him. "Watch this." For a half-hour, she has him show her the bulk of his stock. She talks and walks quickly, refusing every price he offers her. "Twenty bucks," she says. "For you, thirty-five," he responds. "I'm good, aren't I?" she says before she leaves empty-handed.

David, 25, says he has never seen anything like this performance. He sold framed photos on the street in Old Montreal this past summer but this, his rookie year selling trees, is tough. He recently misplaced $500, he hasn't showered for seventeen days, and yesterday he chased down a lady thief--they stood there, each with a hand on the tree, and she wouldn't let go. He eventually stared her down.

David has also ended up at one of the city's worst street corners. The wind that blows in off the Hudson sometimes rolls his trees across the street. On this sidewalk that separates an abandoned lot from a traffic-filled street, he hasn't the opportunity to establish the necessary reciprocal relationships with the locals. There isn't really a neighbourhood here. Yet he refuses to be pessimistic. Next week, when he's handed an envelope stuffed with American green, he'll catch some jazz at the Blue Note and search the city for a vintage saxophone.

Business is brisk at Andreena's stand on the Upper East Side, but there's been some tension between her and her rookie partner, Martin. Both are 29; they're not a "couple," but they still have to share a van. She's worked this stand for three years and she was unimpressed when Martin bought a CD player from a toothless man on the street for 50 bucks. It didn't work, of course. Perhaps she's judgmental because her partner last year disappeared on a 36-hour crack binge. "You've got to be tuned up to deal with New Yorkers," says a wiser Martin now.

Andreena displays her street savvy when a big man in a long coat sidles up to her. He discreetly flashes a badge, and mumbles something about "the boys at the station" and "looking to spend no more than forty-fi' bucks." He's a dead ringer for Andrew Dice Clay and he's looking at one of Andreena's best trees--she'd like to sell it for $120. For 15 minutes she displays her products and shows him the respect he desires. He's still talking tough: "I don't want no needles to drop after a few days, you know what I'm sayin'?" Finally, he leaves with a lesser tree.

Andreena knows it's good policy, when you work on the street, to give deals to the NYPD. But she doesn't believe he was a cop. "He's mob," she says. "His shoes were too shiny."

Experienced treesellers not only learn how to cut a deal, they also learn the sweet irony of treeselling: Americans' notion of the picayune French Canadian coureur-de-bois is what helps the treesellers make big money. "New Yorkers think we come down here on a truck with the trees," says Catherine, who drove her father's van down from Quebec City. "Often we suggest that we do."