Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Lafayette Square in LaGrange will soon be filled with festive Christmas trees to celebrate the holiday season and support a local nonprofit.

Tinsel Trail is a fundraiser for Circles of Troup County that will display 50 live Christmas trees in the downtown LaGrange square. Local businesses, groups and individuals are invited to sponsor and decorate a tree to show off their holiday spirit and help support a good cause.

The trees will be on display from Nov. 18 to Jan. 1 and will be free and open to the public.

The event is a fundraiser for Circles of Troup County, a local nonprofit that works to identify and eliminate the causes of poverty and support those wishing to lift themselves out of poverty.

Circles of Troup County Director Sherri Brown said sponsorships for the trees will help support their efforts throughout the year.

“We are a nonprofit. We don’t receive government funding, so we have to raise our budget every year,” Brown said. “We thought it would just be a fun experience for the community a way to show off some of our partners and our supporters that are part of the community.”

“This is a way for the community to support their neighbors, who are moving out of poverty,” she said.

Circles is hoping the event will be a big draw for the downtown area throughout the holiday season.

“We hope lots of people will come and while they’re there, they can shop in our downtown area and enjoy the things we have in LaGrange,” she said.

Brown said the event is modeled after similar events in Huntsville and Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Those cities have been very gracious in sharing information about the event, she said.

A Circles participant in the welding program at West Georgia Tech helped provide the tree stands that will be needed for the event.

“She connected us, we bought the materials and they made the tree stands as a class project,” Brown said, noting one of the biggest challenges was finding 50 tree stands.

Tree sponsorships range from $400 to $1000, which includes a live 6 to 8-foot tree and electricity for lights. Tree sponsors will be responsible for decorating their trees during setup periods on Nov. 18-19.

Brown said the City of LaGrange has been very supportive of the endeavor by allowing them to set up trees in the square and providing access to electrical power. The tree lights will be run from dusk till dawn and off during the day. Sponsors are asked to use outdoor LED lights for the trees.

For more information on sponsoring a tree, email margaret.mn@gmail.com or call (706) 416-7788.