A discussion of the claims and realities of the Referendum on the Christmas Tree Promotion, Research, and Information Order.
With a vote as important as the upcoming referendum, there is bound to be a lot of information and discussion of the situation Christmas Tree growers are facing. This page addresses incomplete statements or false claims that do not accurately reflect reality.
TOPIC ONE:
How Vote Yes is Funded.
The 2018 Vote Yes effort spent $100,000 and was funded by donations, real and in-kind, by the Christmas Tree Promotion Board.
REALITY:
The 2018 Vote Yes effort spent less than 1/10 of this claim and was funded and run entirely by the volunteer efforts of over 65 people from nearly every state. These donors believe in the importance of supporting the Real Tree industry.
As far as the
FACTTS CLAIM:
The VOTE YES campaign has spent tens of thousands of dollars traveling to state growers’ meeting.
REALITY:
The VOTE YES campaign has not spent any money from the funds it has raised to cover travel expenses. The VOTE YES campaign supporters who spoke at these meetings were members of their respective associations. These supporters were already going to their winter meetings thus no additional funds were necessary.
TOPIC TWO:
The Value of Marketing
The market for Christmas trees is only 40 million households and that Real trees has 75% of those 40 million households.
REALITY:
Of the 129 million households in the US, approximately 100 million display a Christmas tree, Real or fake. Most recent sales figures suggest that Real tree sales were about 27 million trees and that Real trees are displayed in only 27% of the households that display a Christmas tree. So FACTTS is abandoning 70 million households as potential purchasers of Real Trees. Vote Yes 2019 believes that any household who chooses to spend their dollars on a Christmas tree is part of our market. We need to convince the 70 million households who are displaying a fake tree that a Real tree is a better choice.
Real trees are only purchased and displayed in households of more than 3 persons, households that are Christian, and are headed by persons over 25 years of age and under 55 years of age.
REALITY:
Real trees are sold to whomever wants them, and that includes households with no children, single parents, and persons under 25 and over 55, even households that are not Christian.
FACTTS CLAIM:
It is a complete waste of money to impress potential buyers with the benefits of Real Trees.
REALITY:
If making favorable impressions to potential buyers about the benefits of a product is a waste of money, why are we flooded with impressions from Ford, GMC, and Dodge extolling the benefits of their respective automobiles? Have FedEx, UPS, and, USPS all wasted their money with their recent Christmas ads which tried to impress us with the benefits of using them for our next package shipment?
Of
FACTTS CLAIM:
We work in a unique industry from a marketing perspective. In surveys where consumers are exposed to marketing messages and profess to have been convinced to buy a real tree in December, the survey organization can contact the consumers who professed to have been convinced by the messages after Christmas. They either bought a tree or not. So that is a pretty good test of the effectiveness of the message. Christmas trees are unique in that respect. Any other product can be bought any time after the survey. Christmas trees have to be bought between Thanksgiving (or maybe the weekend before) and before Christmas. So we can actually check up on the effectiveness of the CTPB’s campaign. I understand that the marketing organizations the CTPB has hired are reluctant to do that. It is disappointing that the CTPB is insufficiently secure in its position to spend a few more dollars in the interest of investigating whether its campaigns have any effect on actual Christmas tree purchases.
REALITY:
Our surveys do not measure the incidence of consumers who “profess to be convinced to buy a real tree in December” due to marketing messages. No survey could reliably measure the effect of a promotion on their behavior. Purchasing decisions are a complex, multivariate, and at least partially, subconscious process. No one can really testify what individual stimulus “caused” something. Instead, we measure variables independently (like the incidence of seeing messages, and incidence of buying a real tree) and identify correlations, within the bounds of certain statistical precision. And that’s what our current approach does.
While possible, the suggestion that we implement a longitudinal study (with the exact same respondents, pre- and post-campaign) is oversimplified and flawed for the following reasons:
1. The subject’s participation in the study creates a bias for their behavior. The pre-test would have the potential of priming the respondents for the desired behaviors (or at least the assumed, desired answers).
2. The required sample size to work with a representative sample would increase costs dramatically. Getting a sufficient sample (of those who saw the promotions naturally through the media) would be difficult and require very large recruitment for the pre-wave study.
What could be done? Typically, a classic “brand awareness” study would measure simple awareness and familiarity with a brand or product, before and after an ad campaign. Our product, Real Christmas Trees, is a bit of a different animal, in that it has universal awareness already. This is why we measure the awareness/understanding of certain key themes or messages about real Christmas trees to track the efficacy of various message themes and support points within those themes.
FACTTS CLAIM:
You cannot spend campaign money to increase demand for generic commodities.
REALITY:
We believe the 22 agricultural commodities currently participating in checkoff programs would disagree. Checkoff programs were not developed as a way to take farmers’ money. They were developed to increase commodity demand and long-term economic growth for the participating industry.
Curious about all of the research and promotion programs authorized by the USDA since 1966? You can check out the complete list of commodities participating here: https://www.ams.usda.gov/rules-regulations/research-promotion
TOPIC THREE:
Conducting Research
Research funds are not needed because The Agricultural Research Service and Universities are better at it.
REALITY:
We agree, Universities are the best at conducting research, but someone still needs to request and fund it!
The truth is that financial support for Real Tree studies at universities is vanishing. As a result, the number of universities that have researchers conducting Real Tree research projects is dwindling. Without demand or industry support to fund such studies, positions are not being refilled when they are left vacant by retirees.
We must continuously support and fund research otherwise, how will we solve the challenges we face in Real Tree production?
No research results have been published from the $600,000 committed to research from CTPB.
REALITY:
This claim is partly true. Research takes time to conduct and projects that were proposed in the early years of available money are just now being completed.
Take a look at the video Vote Yes 2019 recently released about research dollars used in developing applications of drones in producing a Christmas tree crop in North Carolina.
You can also read this PDF, which is an article that covers
TOPIC FOUR:
CTPB and Supporting Vote Yes
The CTPB provided material and financial support to Vote Yes 2019.
REALITY:
As required by law, CTPB cannot provide material or financial support to the Vote Yes 2019 Campaign. CTPB has not provided material or financial support to the Vote Yes 2019 Campaign.
Vote Yes 2019 accidentally found information on the CTPB website and used it.
REALITY:
We intentionally went to the CTPB website and used the same public information that FACTTS has failed to use. We did not make up any of our information as has FACTTS.
TOPIC FIVE:
How CTPB Spends Money
FACTTS CLAIM:
We want to get rid of this unwanted, unnecessary, useless, and expensive CTPB organization, which has spent about $6 million without any noticeable result in tree sales.
REALITY:
This is not accurate. The CTPB had only collected $5.1 as of January 1 when this claim was made. Through July 31, 2018, the CTPB had spent under $4.1 million.
Last year Christmas tree growers again paid about $1.65 million to the Christmas Tree Promotion Board (CTPB) for zero return on their investment.
REALITY:
While the dollar figure is accurate, we’d like to address the claim that there has been zero return on investment:
1.The CTPB funded $213,375 for research in just one year. These funds were put to work studying issues that will have a return on investment for growers from coast to coast.
2. The CTPB marketing campaign, ‘It’s Christmas. Keep it Real!’ produced materials that national news outlets discovered and featured in pieces about real Christmas trees. Even if the marketing campaign had never run, the resulting coverage from news outlets using the video and message was worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in exposure and awareness of the benefits of choosing to celebrate with a real tree.
Can we reasonably expect to make the American public more aware of Christmas trees (the product) and the Christmas season (the occasion for the product’s use) with a $1.65 million dollar effort of which $800,000 is spent on a marketing campaign the other half is spend on various administrative expenses with $200,000 paid to USDA for supervision and start up fees?
REALITY:
This claim is problematic on multiple levels.
First, as stated in other sections, the goal of the
Second, the math in this claim amounts to the CTPB spending $650,000 on administrative expenses in fiscal year 17/18 alone. This is nowhere near accurate. In fact, it exceeds the grand total of our administrative costs in the four fiscal years the CTPB has been operating. The CTPB administrative expenses for operating have been: 2015 – $104,560, 2016 – $188,415, 2017 – $148,500, and 2018 – $153,500, which totals $594,975.
The cost of developing the public information on the CTPB website is $100,000.
REALITY:
Could be, but we don’t know for sure what it cost nor does FACTTS. This is another FACTTS ‘fact’ that is made up.
TOPIC SIX:
What happens if the No Vote wins?
If the referendum is defeated, the CTPB remaining funds will be distributed to growers who have paid their assessments.
REALITY:
Not true. When the Order was approved by the required referendum last year, the required escrow account was closed, and the funds made available to the Board. If the referendum is defeated this year, according to 1214.83 Proceedings after termination: (d) Any residual funds not required to defray the necessary expenses of liquidation shall be turned over to the Secretary to be disposed of, to the extent
After the 2018 referendum passed, the board voted to earmark 50% of the escrowed funds for research.
If we vote them (the CTPB) out of business this April 2019, all past dues and fines disappear, evaporate, are gone.
REALITY:
This is not true. Past dues and fines will not disappear, or as stated in §1214.84 the Christmas Tree Promotion, Research and Information Order, “The termination of this subpart…shall not…affect or waive any right, duty, obligation, or liability… [or] release or extinguish any violation”.
These details, along with the other implications of the termination of the CTPB, are outlined clearly in the §1214.84 of the order, which you can review here.
Questions about and for
- Why are the
FACTTS supporters willing to cede 70% of the market to fake trees? - Who will conduct the research to help us solve our production problems, and where will the money come from if our industry is not willing to pay for it?
- What will your business be worth to a future buyer of your business if there is no market for your product?