A huge Tayside estate with more than a million Christmas trees has gone on the market for £7 million.
The 584-acre site at Strathmartine includes Tayside Forestry Christmas Trees, Tayside Forestry Firewood, each of which have annual sales of about £1m.
Also on the estate – the size of more than 300 football pitches – is the Pine Cone café and gift shop.
The land for sale additionally includes two semi-detached four-bedroom cottages and workers accommodation.
‘I’ve done my time’, says owner
Current owner Brian Hughes wants to take a step back, having been at the helm for the past 25 years.
He said: “I’ve done my time. I’ve been working on the Christmas trees from the age of 10 when I used to help my father.
“I’ve grown the business to the size it’s at just now and it’s probably got a lot of capacity to grow further with the right person to take it over.”
The Christmas tree business was set up nearly 60 years ago by Brian’s father Gordon.
He was looking to earn some extra money for Christmas, and the business began on a nine-acre small holding in Glenshee.
The first batch of trees were sold at auction at Curr & Dewar in Dundee.
The business moved to the current site at Templeton Farm nearly a decade ago.
In that time, output has increased to almost 80,000 trees per year with nearly 500 acres in planted production.
Difficult decision to sell Christmas tree farm
Mr Hughes said the decision to sell had been “very difficult”.
But he was pleased to have guided the Christmas tree farm successfully through the pandemic, and a fire in April 2019.
He said: “We’ve faced some pretty hard challenges over the past three years.
“The fire destroyed one of our sheds, and it has been a long recovery from that.
“Covid came along and presented other challenges, not just to my business, but for the whole of the world.
“We’re in an uncertain economic time with rising costs, but I’d like to think that will all settle down again.
“I’ve built up a business but I think I’ve done my bit now.”
Mr Hughes said when he first started working for his dad, he could never have imagined the business would grow to its current size.
He believes there is scope to expand the business further.
It currently employs about 40 people, with extra workers brought in during the Christmas tree harvest season.
Plans for the future
Mr Hughes has no immediate plans to retire, but hopes to go travelling and fit in more time for golf.
The 55-year-old said he would assess his options once the sale was complete.
The huge site also includes processing buildings, including a power plant shed.
There is also a solar panel system, with proposals to expand it to increase its capacity from 8KW to 50KW, and a 15KW wind turbine.
A total of 392 acres of arable land and 192 acres of let ground is also included.
There has already been interest, according to Ross Low, head of agency and valuation for selling agents Bidwells.
He said: “The interest has been really good. It is a really specialist offering, but it is already appealing to established growers.
“It has also attracted interest from agricultural and environmental businesses looking to add another string to their bow.”
Conversation