“We’ve got a planting project, and we need trees.”
That’s how a lot of our conversations start. We’d like to say it’s that simple, but it’s not.
Are you looking to fill orders or gaps? Or are you looking to plan ahead, choose better trees (and better-suited trees), and build a stronger urban forest over time? This is the difference between buying trees and having a relationship with a wholesale tree nursery grower.
For many small cities, or even small teams, knowing who grows and supplies your trees matters. If you’re wondering how insights and experience from a tree grower can change your plan and project, let’s dig in.
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The most logical place to start when it comes to sourcing is to understand the options available.
Wholesale nurseries grow a variety of plants for retail garden centers, box stores, landscapers, re-wholesalers, and municipal customers rather than selling to homeowners.
Wholesale tree growers specialize in growing trees. More specifically, they handle propagation, species and cultivar selection, root development, pruning, spacing, and long-term planning. They create partnerships with buyers to ensure that what’s grown and supplied will perform well and meet buyer and environmental needs.
Resellers often buy plants from other nurseries and sell what they can source and what’s available. As a result, they may be able to meet the needs of municipalities or other large-scale projects that have specific tree requests by pulling plants from a variety of wholesale growers.
All of these are, of course, very different from a retail nursery, which provides trees, shrubs, flowers, tools, and more for homeowners or smaller projects.
For city foresters and municipal teams, these distinctions are important. The tree source you choose affects everything from availability and quality to substitutions and the ability to meet the longer-term goals outlined in your urban forest master plan.
The biggest question you’ll have to answer when sourcing trees for any large-scale or municipal projects is not “Who has trees?” but where did those trees come from? The follow-ups should include “How were they grown?” and “Can you help me plan for what’s next?”
A tree reseller is often sourcing trees from multiple nurseries and farms based on what’s currently available. When you need to fill a gap or satisfy a small project, this might work, but the tradeoff, especially when scaling, can be difficult to get consistent supply. When you don’t know where a tree is coming from, you don’t know anything about its quality, its root systems, or whether it’s suitable for your region.
In contrast, tree growers are involved in every choice and every decision from propagation to sale. In fact, it’s often more about strategy than a sale. It’s not just what’s available right now (though that may also be far more significant than other options), but it’s also about working with them for next year, three years, or a longer master tree plan.
This relationship creates a much less reactive tree sourcing situation. Can’t find what you need? A tree grower may not be able to help in the short term if it isn’t something they are currently growing, but with proper planning, they can develop a production plan that provides a consistent supply of trees to meet your city master plan or project needs.
With a reseller, you can buy on the fly. Dealing with an unexpected gap or need to make an immediate replacement? A reseller is likely your best option. The upside is that convenience, but it also means you don’t get what you want; you get what’s there.
In contrast, when you purchase directly from a tree grower, you will typically place your order up to a year in advance. This allows the grower to consider demand in their planting and production schedule. The truth is, landscape-grade trees can take up to 7 years to grow, and once they’re sold, you’ll have to wait until the next crop is ready.
With a reseller, you can often order anytime, with spring being their busy season as foresters and landscapers look to complete spring planting projects. In contrast, tree growers usually have an ordering window in July/August followed by an allocation process to resolve allocation in cases where trees have been over-sold. It gets easier to see why this relationship matters for tree procurement and why a multi-year contract can better support multi-year projects. An early order helps ensure you’ve got a chance at high-demand trees or those that are harder to get.
Even resellers are purchasing from tree growers in July and August, so they have the inventory available to sell in the spring. By spring, tree growers' inventory is pretty minimal, as most of the trees are already spoken for and have been allocated to those who ordered in summer of the previous year.
When it comes to urban forests or municipal trees, survivability is one of the most important factors municipal teams and city foresters must consider. But how can you predict survivability before something goes in the ground, especially when there are so many other factors to contend with?
The answer is pretty simple. Tree health starts well before any order is placed and well before they arrive at their future home. Everything matters, from propagation and how and where it’s grown to how the roots and canopy were managed.
This is truly where the wholesale tree nursery grower stands out from either a reseller or a wholesale nursery. A reseller can find trees, but a tree grower? They’ve got way more insight into the tree and how it was grown.
Years before a tree is planted in a city park, along a street, near a school, or in any community, a tree grower is thinking about species selection, cultivar selection and propagation, spacing, pruning, irrigation, root development, and availability. While a reseller searches for trees, a grower produces them.
Why is this an important distinction? Tree availability isn’t instant. Whether it’s large-caliper shade trees, less-common species, regional cultivars, or even high-demand native trees, getting them where they need to be often requires years of planning. For any city working to diversify its canopy and looking beyond common, overused trees, a grower relationship can help, as trees can be propagated, inventory increased, and even reserved in advance.
And, perhaps more importantly, when it comes time for a substitution, a grower can often recommend a better alternative– right tree, right place– requires knowing not only the trees you have available and where they might thrive, but also understanding the buyer’s needs and long-term forestry or landscaping goals.
A tree’s canopy is often where we focus our attention, but that canopy isn’t successful without strong roots. And, to get to that point, you need trees that can not only handle transplant stress but also establish quickly and grow resilient. This also starts with the roots.
Because growers know how their trees were produced (field-grown, container-grown, air-pruned) and when they were shifted from one to the other, they have a stronger sense of root health.
For example, a grower may start trees in the ground and then, using a bare-root machine, move them into air pots (as SuperTrees does), providing insights into root health and helping trees avoid circling roots or poor root structure.
For cities in Colorado, Utah, Oregon, and the Intermountain West, root quality is essential given the environmental stressors trees may face from compacted soils and dry sites to heat islands, high winds, or even limited soil volume. These are challenging for any tree, but better root systems at the time of transplantation can help with establishment, reduce replacement costs, and improve survivability across species.
When it comes to large planting projects, there are two primary goals: consistency and diversity. Cities need uniformity to meet project- or site-specific requirements and ensure consistent performance. However, this has to be balanced with enough tree diversity to avoid the problems that monocultures can create.
A wholesale tree nursery grower is in the best position to support both of these goals. Because they’re working, planting, and growing strategically, they can help cities think and plan beyond a single order. This means helping city foresters and municipal teams reserve trees, identify underused species, provide unique, regionally adapted cultivars, and build diversity into procurement planning rather than reactive purchasing driven by urgent needs.
While a reseller may be good in a pinch and able to fill in some blanks by pulling from different suppliers, those different suppliers may impact consistency and uniformity. You may get variations in size, form, root quality, and growing history. Over time, these inconsistencies can create issues in establishment, maintenance, and performance. In turn, these problems often demand more time and resources.
Perhaps one essential element of sourcing, especially from a grower, is that tree sourcing is never one-size-fits-all, especially across the Intermountain West. Elevation, heat, soil type, winter conditions, wind, all factor into how well a tree performs in a specific region.
A wholesale nursery grower, especially one who works regionally, can help cities choose trees well-suited for their growing conditions and locations, and that fit into a larger plan rather than just picking one off a list.
For cities and municipalities in Colorado, Utah, Oregon, and the Intermountain West, there are a few regional concerns that a regional tree grower is going to have specific knowledge about and be able to offer insights:
Growers understand these regional concerns and can offer advice on tree selection, not just when you need them and for substitutions, but well in advance, as you plan longer term for your urban forest.
Most procurement issues and concerns can be solved with strategy rather than reactivity. In other words, “What can we find?” isn’t a tree sourcing, procurement, or planting strategy, and a relationship with a grower can prevent that.
In fact, conversations with growers go a little bit differently and often involve better questions such as:
In short, a relationship with a grower can help you plan better, choose better, and ultimately support your planting projects and programs over years rather than reflexively filling gaps with what’s available.
RFPs and bids can be challenging, even for seasoned teams, and one of the big challenges is that tree lists are often wish lists and what’s available may not match. When you work with a grower, they can help you understand what’s realistically available and help you keep track of that throughout the year.
They can also help you understand what sizes will work, lead times, and substitutions or species before anything is finalized.
On the city’s end, this makes budgets more realistic, reduces last-minute substitutions and the scramble that might ensue, and helps teams better prepare for larger or longer-term projects. Instead of one-time purchases, conversations can center on a procurement plan that covers production, reservations, and tree delivery, ensuring you get the trees you want and need.
There may come a time when what you want isn’t available or isn’t available in the quantity you need. Substitutions are inevitable, but a grower relationship can be incredibly valuable here. When a reseller may only be able to offer what they can find, a grower is much better prepared to offer alternatives based on site conditions, growth, water needs, canopy diversity, and other concerns you may have about the planting site.
The reality is that "available" and "appropriate" are not the same thing. Any substitution should still fit your planting goals and the intended planting site.
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A forest isn’t planted at once. This is true for urban forests as well, regardless of their size. The same goes for large communities, HOAs, or even managed landscapes. Often, planting happens in phases. You may be building out new parks, diversifying after losses from pests or disease, working through a master plan, or simply allowing time for trees to establish in newer communities before adding more.
That long-term plan requires a multi-year strategy and support. Growers can help you plan ahead, propagate and plant trees to meet your needs, and develop a canopy diversity plan. And, when working consistently with a grower, a contract can help ensure earlier access or guaranteed access to specific species or sizes.
For municipalities or urban forestry teams, working with a wholesale tree nursery grower is a major advantage, as you gain the advantage of a knowledgeable partner who understands tree production, procurement, and planting.
Caveat emptor goes for trees as much as anything else, so RFPs (a blog coming soon!) should ask important questions that go beyond pricing and availability. For anyone sourcing trees, for any project, whether the nursery can provide quality trees, in the time frame you need, while delivering on canopy diversity and survivability goals, is a great place to start.
That said, these questions will get you closer to understanding how much visibility a nursery has into its planning, propagation, production, root health, and more.
These questions will help you understand where the trees are coming from and how mindful the nursery is about the growing history and trends.
This is more than basic measurements. While height and caliper may matter, those are largely aesthetics. What you’re digging for here (pardon the pun) is information on root structure, canopy training/pruning, trunk development, and how quickly it will establish.
Availability is the biggest challenge for any forester, landscaper, or property manager. Understanding how the nursery handles this process, especially when large quantities or specific cultivars are needed, is essential.
There are, and will be, times when a reseller will do the trick and may be your best choice. For example, they can deliver a small number of trees to fill a last-minute gap. They may also be able to network for other tree needs as they often have access to multiple suppliers. In a pinch, that can be very helpful.
If your goal, however, is long-term urban forest growth and health, then the better route is a grower who’s got a closer connection to the trees and how they were selected, planted, and produced.
Because growers see the tree from propagation to production, they know everything (or should) about the growing history, root management, pruning, suitability, and forthcoming availability. That also means they’re invested in, and connected to, the final product and its quality in a way that resellers, who sell someone else’s product are not.
Because growers see the tree from propagation to production, they know everything (or should) about the growing history, root management, pruning, suitability, and forthcoming availability. That also means they’re invested in, and connected to, the final product and its quality in a way that resellers, who sell someone else’s product, are not. From the consumer side, that translates to pride in product and accountability. Growers aren’t moving merchandise and inventory; they're building a pipeline with thought and care, often in collaboration with customers.
For urban foresters, municipal teams, and property managers making long or longer-term plans, a wholesale tree nursery grower is a resources not just for sourcing but for project planning and aftercare services. Growers care about the longevity and survivability of your investment, in large part because they’re invested too.
While resellers may fill and immediate need, it’s transactional. A grower will help you build a strategy, a plan, and see it through to fruition.
Think about your expectations for your trees, the expectations of your community, visitors, and other stakeholders. Trees are an investment, not just in money, but time and your city and so there’s added value in working toward a healthy canopy. That’s not something you trust to just any nursery.
What you’re looking for, especially smaller cities who may not have big teams or even teams with tons of experience, is a true partner who can help you make the best decisions, well before you’ve purchased or planted anything.
When you’re talking to a potential nursery partner, you want more than a list of trees you can buy; you want insights into how the trees are grown and how they perform regionally (which often requires an ongoing relationship); you want information about root systems, growth patterns, procurement timelines, and specific species or cultivars.
A relationship with your grower gets you all of that including support on your urban forestry master plan, RFPs, building and phasing out planting programs, replacing failed trees and understanding why they failed, and, perhaps most importantly, how to stretch a limited tree budget (and in some cases where to find or how to ask for more money).
Resellers can be useful, but when it comes to quality, consistency, suitability, and survivability, then working with a wholesale tree nursery grower is a better starting point.
SuperTrees began with the longview in mind. We asked, “How can we do this better?” The initial answer was in developing trees with superior root systems, but it’s about much more than that. From propagation and tree selection to delivery, planting support, and tree services, we’re ready to help you and your city or project build a healthier, more resilient landscape.
Our team is ready to send you our availability list and talk about your longer-term plans and needs and how we can help you grow.