Sweet returns
Tapping into the seventh generation, the maple syrup business has run in the Crinklaw family for more than 190 years
Photo: Jennifer and Reid Crinklaw are the seventh generation to run Crinklaw Maple Products, which was established in 1832
IT’S MID-JANUARY, THE sun is still setting before 5 p.m., and the Crinklaws are watching the weather, waiting for the moment they tap the trees and kick off maple syrup season for another year.
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“You’re just kind of watching the calendar and watching the weather forecast — and you’re just keeping an eye out for above freezing temperatures coming down in the two-week forecast,” says Reid Crinklaw, the seventh generation of Crinklaw, who runs most of the operations at the Crinklaw Maple Products farm south of the city.
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For the last few weeks, they’ve been finishing up their prep work for the year — cleaning lines, clearing fallen trees, running maintenance on heavy equipment, that sort of thing. In historical terms, it is still early for maple syrup, even considering the two- to three-week head start Crinklaw gets by virtue of being much further south than the core syrup producing areas of Eastern Ontario, Quebec and Northern Ontario. “Maybe one in every five years we do make syrup in January,” Crinklaw says.
Syrup producers are happiest in a temperature band from around minus 5°C to plus 5°C, where sap is freezing at night and thawing — and thus flowing — during the day. And you only get about a six-week season from the time you tap your trees, so trying to time it right is critical. “You make hay when the sun shines; same goes for syrup,” Crinklaw says.
The Crinklaw family has been making syrup in one form or another since 1832, says Jennifer Crinklaw, Reid’s wife. Together, they are the seventh generation of Crinklaw to live and work on the farm, located on Westminster Road just off the 402.
“The first four generations would have been living on this land, making syrup for their own use,” she explains. It was the fifth generation, Reid’s grandparents, who started selling syrup to the public and expanding the commercial operations in the 1970s. In the 1980s, they built a new sugar house on the property, which is the one still in use today.
“There were always friends and family back in the sugar bush. Lots of good memories from growing up around a maple syrup operation” —Reid Crinklaw
Syrup, Reid says, runs in his veins. A bit cliché, perhaps, but growing up he always knew that his future was in maple products. “It’s one of those things where you catch the bug when you’re young,” he says. As a kid, he remembers syrup seasons being a time of real community around the Crinklaw farm. “I spent all my free time in the spring helping, as far back as I can remember. There were always friends and family back in the sugar bush. Lots of good memories from growing up around a maple syrup operation.”
His parents, Mark and Carol Crinklaw, still own the company, but the day is coming soon when Reid and Jennifer will take over full-time. “They are wanting to slow down a little bit, but not really there yet; they’re still very active in day-to-day operations,” Crinklaw says of his parents. “Jen and I both work off-farm; at some point it will likely mean that one of us is stepping back from our full-time off-farm job, and when that happens there’ll be more of a full-time role for one of us.”
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From a business perspective, Crinklaw is fortunate enough to be self-sustaining, Crinklaw says, with much of their syrup production in the winter supported by cash crops they grow in the summer. In an average year, they’ll produce anywhere from 1,000 to 1,200 gallons of syrup, and almost all of that goes right into the local market, sold either through wholesale arrangements or from their on-farm store, which Jennifer runs. Demand, Reid says, has stayed strong over the years.
“The last few years, demand has been very, very good,” Crinklaw says. “We can sell everything out of our store, which is a big plus for us, and we’re so close to London that we have a lot of traffic. So, it’s kind of different than a lot of farms or maple operations that are in the middle of a rural area, with not a lot of population. We’re lucky in that way, for sure.”
As they look to the future, the seventh generation of Crinklaws don’t foresee any radical changes. They have a healthy dose of respect for the tradition that gets baked into a business over seven generations, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t eyeing a few little improvements here and there. “There’s a few things, but not a lot that we would change,” says Crinklaw. “There are tweaks to put our own flair on it that we’d like to do — nothing that is very necessary at the moment, but just some little things.”
By the time this article makes it to print, maple syrup season will likely be in full swing. But for now, the Crinklaws are simply waiting for it all to kick off. They’re on syrup’s time now. “You never know,” Crinklaw says. “It could be three weeks; it could be another month and a half before anything happens. You just never know.” 
Kieran Delamont