Hey fellow sweet lovers! Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Peggy. I would like to tell you about our business and our sweet maple products. Maple syrup is absolutely a Vermont tradition. I remember visiting small sugarhouses in northern Vermont as a child, mucking through wet snow and mud, taking in that sweet smell of maple as steam rose off the boiling sap, and eating sugar on snow, a treat for the taste buds.
When my husband, Jon, decided he wanted to be a sugarmaker, I had no idea what to expect. That was in 2010 and since then we have renovated our barn to house the sugarhouse, bought a lot of supplies and equipment, established two sugarbushes on leased land, bought a lot of supplies and equipment, procured places to wholesale our products, bought a lot of supplies and equipment, and finally finished our website and online store. Did I mention buying a lot of supplies and equipment?
Harvesting sap and making maple syrup is an expensive and physically demanding business. But for our family, it is (mostly) a labor of love. Jon is the brains behind the operation. He started out knowing virtually nothing about sugaring. He has learned how to run pipelines, tap trees, set up vacuum systems, boil sap, filter and bottle syrup and somehow, amidst all of that, how to market maple syrup and run a business.
Our son, Justin, is the tech geek. He built our website and set up the online store and shipping capability. He also created a program for us to track our production each year. Besides being the man behind the computer, he’s out in the woods with Jon helping run the pipeline and make repairs. He taps trees faster than any of us, helps collect sap, and serves as the young muscle when something REALLY heavy needs to get from one place to another.
Our son, Jacob, lives about 3 hours away. (Rumor has it he moved there to get away from the family business.) Nonetheless, he is our artist. He created our logo which we proudly display on our syrup bottles, on our sap silo, on our website, just about anywhere we can. He also photographed our products for the website. He is the writer in the family and will likely have something to say about this blog. Be kind, Jacob!
I have to talk about Jon’s sister Julie and her husband, Paul. Paul helps tap and wanders the sugarbush looking for needed repairs. He does the majority of our sap collection which requires driving back and forth to the two sugarbushes, pumping sap into the collection truck, driving it back to the farm and pumping it into our sap silo. One day this past week, he made 8 trips back and forth with a total of 4,000+ gallons of sap. Julie politely puts up with him not being around much at times during sugaring season. By the way, Julie, I hope the dishwasher eventually got fixed.
And finally there’s me. I do consume a lot of maple syrup. Maybe that makes me quality control? I try to help where I can. I’ve learned how to tap, and I’m learning how to find leaks in the system where critters or fallen branches or the like have caused damage. I hope to someday learn how to repair those leaks when I find them. Justin and I work together to label our products and package them for delivery when we have an order. And now I guess I’m a blogger.
In my upcoming blogs, I plan to share details about our sugaring operation. This year’s season is just about over from the looks of the weather forecast, but, alas, a farmer’s work is never done. I will have some pictures, links to videos, etc. so you can see how our small team operates.