Bill introduced our guest speaker, Arnold Coombs of Bascom Maple Farms. Arnold is part of the Coombs
family that has been involved in maple syrup production and sales for seven generations. He is a
leader in industry associations. Arnold spoke about changes in the industry. His knowledge is
based on growing up in the business, doing deliveries as a young person all over New England,
and becoming engaged in the business some years after college. Arnold’s family owned the
Coombs Family Farm, which was sold to Bascom Family Farm. The owners of the two companies had a
close and trusting business relationship and had relied on handshake deals in the past. Arnold has
now worked at Bascom for 27 years. It is the largest producer of maple syrup in the region and
the whole United States. Maple syrup and maple sugar production have fluctuated over the
decades and beyond. In the 1960s production was lower, and in the 1970s it was the lowest it had
been. The years 1864-1865 were very high production maple sugar years due to the war, when
northern people did not want to buy sugar from southern producers. In later times into the
twentieth century, maple syrup became a larger commodity replacing much of the maple sugar
production. In 2024 and the decades leading up to it, there has been huge growth in maple syrup
production. Canada is now the biggest grower, producing approximately 70% of the world’s
maple syrup. The U.S. used to be the dominant producer but now does less. The older technology
included large taps and buckets on trees. The current technology has moved away from buckets
to tubing with newer, smaller spouts that do less damage to the trees but allow the same amount
of flow. Other technological changes are vacuum pumps, which increase the productivity of the
tree. They are a closed system and extend the harvesting season to approximately three months.
The buckets season was closer to six weeks. Technology allows for monitors to be placed on the
tubing lines, and an app on the producer’s phone will show where a leak is. There is a much
higher yield in maple syrup production now than there used to be. Current production has
doubled in 20 years. Bascom buys a lot of syrup from upstate New York. It also buys a lot of
production from northern Maine and ships around the world. There is much more maple syrup in
supermarkets now than in decades past and there is greater availability. In the 1970s reverse
osmosis was a new technology introduced to maple syrup production that greatly changed the
industry. It was a process similar to desalinization. It reduces the amount of boiling needed to
produce syrup.
In regard to maple syrup pricing, there is a Canadian federation that sets the price, and the U.S.
producers follow the same pricing regimen. This keeps the markets relatively stable and is an
improvement over the pre-federation days when prices could fluctuate wildly and regionally. It
also doesn’t allow big companies to take advantage of smaller producers.
Bill Vermouth made a brag for Mr. Coombs and his business which has been a great supporter of
our Rotary Golf Tournament.
The meeting was adjourned at 1:20pm