Carli Frigon: UMaine first-year finds career interest through work at family sugarbush

Every spring when the sap starts running, Carli Frigon, her brother Carroll and her parents, Jereme and Donna, stay at their sugarhouse in the small northern Maine town of Sandy Bay. From the age of 9, Frigon’s March memories have consisted of building snow forts, making hot cocoa, tasting the sweetness of syrup on snow and heading to school straight from the sugar bush with her brother. 

Frigon’s parents began their maple sugaring venture in 2015, working endless hours to prepare the site and tap 4,000 trees for their first crop of the sticky sweet syrup. Gray Jay Mapleworks, named in honor of Frigon’s great grandfathers, talented woodsmen in their time, was born. 

Frigon points to her work in the sugarbush as a formative experience. As she prepares for her first year at the University of Maine as a mechanical engineering major with a keen interest in business and marketing, she sees the dedication of her parents and their work at the sugarhouse as sparking some of that interest. 

“We kind of had to start it from the ground up. There wasn’t even a road into our sugarhouse. So we built the sugarhouse, built the road in and they put us to work,” Frigon said with a laugh. “That’s always been a part of my life. Even before that, we made maple syrup in our backyard by collecting sap at my grandmother’s, then bringing it home to boil. Right now we have about 8,400 trees and we go to festivals and fairs all over the state to sell maple products, and we’re in some stores.”

Frigon currently helps her mother with some aspects of the marketing for Gray Jay Mapleworks, which she noted also helped feed her interest in business. Her end goal? Start one herself.

“I’d like to find an idea in college or do a small business on the side if I come up with something I can do in school,” she said.

Frigon’s mechanical engineering drive was spurred in part by her participation in the Chip Moody Consider Engineering Program, a four-day overnight summer program for high school juniors hosted at UMaine. Her high school science teacher, Evan Worster, encouraged her to attend. She views Worster as a mentor throughout her time in high school.

“We have very small classes,” Frigon said of her time at Forest Hills Consolidated School. “There was me and two other students who had done all the math that our school offered. So he [Worster] made us a little Calculus class so we could get ahead in that. He’s also my softball coach so I’m around him a lot. He’s always been very helpful with work and he wrote a ton of scholarship recommendation letters for me. He’s just been helping me the whole time.”

Frigon’s drive to succeed is apparent through her rank as class valedictorian and her participation in nearly everything her small school has to offer, including softball (her favorite), student council, the math team, National Honor Society, basketball, golf, cross country and volunteering. Plus, of course, her work at the sugar bush.

Overall, she’s excited about the prospect of choice at UMaine and pointed to its accessibility and affordability as important factors in her decision to attend. 

“I applied to a lot of schools, but my dad did go to UMaine and I visited there. It was close to home and really affordable for me, which I really, really appreciate,” Frigon said. “I just want to try a bunch of stuff. I’m excited to go to the hockey and football games because we don’t have anything like that in Jackman.”

As for her parent’s business back home, Frigon intends to continue helping with their venture, gathering additional skills along the way that will continue to foster her business interest and fill April with more memories of the sugar bush. 

Story by Shelby Hartin

Contact: Marcus Wolf, 207.581.3721; marcus.wolf@maine.edu