NEW VINEYARD, Maine — With Easter just days away, a Maine company is helping the White House get things rolling for its annual egg roll this year.
"It's just great,” Maine Wood Concepts Vice President Jody Fletcher said. “It's hard to put into words, but it's an honor."
The company, known for its Fletcher pepper mills, was selected for the fourth time in the last five years to create the official White House Easter eggs.
They are crafted from birch wood, painted yellow, green, blue and pink, and stamped with an image of the white house and the presidential seal.
"We're in the back woods so to speak for us of what's going on in Washington it's just great it's hard to be into words,’ Jody Fletcher said.
His family has been running the New Vineyard-based mill for decades dating back to the 1970s.
From kitchen tools to custom moldings and wooden games pieces, they have had to find ways to innovate to keep the business going as many other mills in the state have shuttered.
"There were 25 mills like ours in the Northeast 20-25 years ago,” he said. “ Now, there's three of us.”
It is pride in the product combined with attention to detail, Fletcher says, which has kept the White House Historical Association coming back to Maine.
Much of that is thanks to the company’s dedicated staff.
"We're basically a big family." Nick Fletcher said.
Together a special team produced nearly 100,000 wooden eggs to be sent to Washington and sold in sets by the Historical Association this year.
"It's very exciting to know that they are going somewhere so big and so popular,” Nick Fletcher said.
The eggs will be included in gift bags handed out to the kids after the annual egg roll event in Washington, D.C. Monday.
Thousands of kids will be on hand to roll hard-boiled eggs across the lawn at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.
“It's really cool. It means a lot to us,” Jody Fletcher said.
The event was first started in 1898, but the tradition of the souvenir eggs began in 1981.