The scent hits you first — pine, sap, the sharp green smell of winter settling over a grassy area now buried under snow at the northeast corner of Pioneer Trail and Flying Cloud Drive, next to the Speedway.
By the time Kyle Gudmundson finishes a shift, the smell follows him.
“I go home smelling like Christmas every day,” he said, smiling as he stood between rows of Fraser firs the day after Thanksgiving.
For the Gudmundsons, the Scouts BSA Troop 695 of Eden Prairie’s Christmas tree lot is a family affair. Kyle helps run the operation as co-chair with Dave Meyer.
His oldest children — Birkir, 17, and Lilja, 15 — work the saws, tie trees to car roofs, answer questions about needle types, and walk younger Scouts through the fine points of customer service. Their younger brother, Darri, usually joins them, though hockey pulled him away on this particular Friday. Kyle’s wife, Olof Indridadottir, also pitches in at the lot when she can.
“It’s great family time,” said Kyle, who lives in Eden Prairie. “We’ve got it down — selling, cutting, tying. It runs like a machine. And we get to have great conversations with people while we’re doing it.”
The lot — a longtime Eden Prairie fixture — sits on a grassy strip next to the gas station, where customers park and wander into the rows of trees. A second, smaller site run by Troop 695 operates just west on Pioneer Trail at the historic Cummins-Phipps-Grill House. But Friday at the main lot felt like the true start, as a steady flow of families and solo shoppers made their way through the rows.
Troop 695 is working with just under 500 trees this season: about 60 at the Cummins site and the rest on Pioneer Trail. Proceeds help Scouts cover the cost of campouts, summer programs and high-adventure trips.
“And then the Scouts earn the majority of the money based on the hours they put in here,” Kyle said.
He said Birkir and Lilja use the fundraiser to pay for much of their Scouting experience — everything from high-adventure trips and campouts to leadership training and specialized merit badges.
Birkir is working toward his Eagle rank. Lilja is on that path as well; she recently completed Gray Wolf, the Scouts’ leadership course, and last summer earned her scuba merit badge and certification ahead of a planned scuba trip to Malta.
Training the next generation
This season is heavy on work for the older Scouts — especially after several members aged out this year, after earning the Eagle Scout rank.
“So we’re in a bit of a transition period,” Kyle said. “The older Scouts who are still here are filling a lot of hours and training the newer Scouts.”
Training starts with the trees.
“The Frasers are our hardier trees — always our best sellers,” Kyle said. “Their close cousin, the balsams, have slightly more supple branches, so they don’t hold as much if you’ve got a lot of heavy ornaments. But they’re more aromatic, so you put them in the house and it smells like Christmas right away.”
White pines, returning for the first time in six years, line a corner of the lot with their long needles and lower price point.
But for many customers, the trees are only part of the draw.
“Over half the people who come for trees, year after year, are really here for scouting,” Kyle said. “They’re not just here for the trees. They want to talk to the kids — ask what they’re doing in scouting, how summer camp went, what the troop’s been up to.”
Troop 695 has been fortunate with supply. Some nearby troops struggled with quality and have since switched to the same Upper Peninsula of Michigan supplier that Troop 695 uses.
“We’ve actually been able to keep the cost the same, and we’re really happy with our suppliers,” Kyle said. “We’ve had people come looking for shorter trees or a Charlie Brown-type tree so they can cut it down and get a discount. We haven’t been able to find any like that this year. It’s not a brag — they’re just all great trees.”
The lot also sells wreaths — a pandemic-era pivot from the days when Scouts went door to door.
Weekend hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.; weeknights usually run from 5 to 7:30 p.m. But the lot never really closes. Customers can Venmo, leave cash or pay by check under Troop 695 after hours.
“If they’re looking for help — tying a tree down, cutting the trunk, that sort of thing — come during our staffed hours,” Kyle said. His phone number is posted on a sign for anyone with questions.
‘Like June in Iceland’
Cold weather doesn’t slow the Gudmundsons.
“She’s got her ‘Zero Hero’ — she’s done a full 24 hours camping outside in below-zero weather,” Kyle said of his daughter, Lilja. “That’s a real Scouting badge of honor.”
In fact, Kyle said all three of his children were born in Iceland and have triple citizenship — Icelandic, American and Canadian.
“My family’s originally from Iceland,” he said. “They all moved to Manitoba in the 1880s. There are still about 60,000 Western Icelanders living there.”
As the afternoon wind picked up across the lot, he barely reacted.
“This is nothing,” Kyle said. “This is like June in Iceland.”
The troop expects to sell out by the second weekend of December. When inventory drops below 20 trees, they begin closing up and donate the final five to 10 to PROP.
Ultimately, the decision belongs to the Scouts.
“This is their fundraiser,” Kyle said. “We’re an adult-supported, Scout-led troop.”
For Birkir, the best part is teaching the younger Scouts.
“I remember being a younger Scout and having an older Scout show me how to tie a tree onto a car or how to talk to customers,” he said. “Now that I’m older, I feel responsible for helping them figure it out.”
Scoutmaster Brad Knorr said the system is simple and fair.
“This is our troop’s major fundraiser,” Knorr explained. “The troop takes a small percentage, and the rest is distributed to the Scouts who work the sale. We total up the hours, divide it, and that amount goes into each Scout’s account.”
By midafternoon Friday, customers kept streaming in — some hunting for the tallest Fraser, some looking for the most aromatic balsam, some simply stopping because they saw the trees while getting gas.
Most will go home with a tree. All will carry a bit of Christmas home with them.
And so will the Gudmundsons.
“We get our own tree from the lot every year,” Kyle said. “We already have it at home. We just grab one off the pile — we know it’s good. We don’t even unwrap it here; we take it home and open it there. It’s a nice little surprise.”
About Troop 695
Troop 695 is based out of Prairie Lutheran Church in Eden Prairie and includes both boys’ and girls’ units. The fundraiser helps Scouts cover the cost of campouts, summer programs, and high-adventure trips, with most proceeds distributed directly to each Scout based on the hours they work at the lot. The troop welcomes new families and regularly shares updates on its Facebook page.
