Suggestions for buying an artificial Christmas tree. Any BTDT that you would like to share?

[Tap]

We will still have our main, real tree in the living room, but I want a smallish 4ft  or so(absolutely not bigger than 6ft), for the back room as well.  Dh Insists on the real tree, but I wan to have a tree for longer than 2 weeks, so I am buying an artificial one too. I want to decorate it around Thanksgiving so I need to get it found and bought.  I am guessing that I have time to order by mail if that is the best way to do it. 

 

 

What do I want or not want?  Good place to buy?  Is it usually a good Black Friday find or should I buy before then? Is it worth it to get Pre-lit?

[OneStepAtATime]

FWIW, I can't really recommend a specific brand but I thought I would mention how much we LOVED our pre-lit tree, bought on clearance right after Christmas a few years ago.  Awesome not to have to string lights and it looked really beautiful.  We loved the ease of the setup and used the same tree for a couple of years with no problems at all....right up until the light system failed and my engineer husband couldn't fix the issue.  Trying to cut off all those wires and then still have to string lights was a royal pain (DH was afraid to leave the wires on the tree in case it got accidentally plugged in and caused a fire hazard).

[housemouse]

Check out Balsam Hill trees. Very realistic and they have skinny versions of some of their full trees if you want tree not to take up a lot of room. We got our on sale they had few years back for less than half of the price. Then there is always Michaels, Joann and Hobby Lobby- they tend to have descent looking trees and many of them skinny enough to tuck away in a corner of the room. They have been running sales on trees at 50-60% off.

 

[MotherGoose]

Check out Balsam Hill trees. Very realistic and they have skinny versions of some of their full trees if you want tree not to take up a lot of room. We got our on sale they had few years back for less than half of the price. Then there is always Michaels, Joann and Hobby Lobby- they tend to have descent looking trees and many of them skinny enough to tuck away in a corner of the room. They have been running sales on trees at 50-60% off.

I agree, we got ours at Balsam Hill too. Can't even tell it's not real unless you go up and sniff it. Nice quality.

[monstermama]

IIRC, a lot of places do put some trees on special for Black Friday, but they're usually not the nicer ones.  The nicer ones have a mix of hard plastic realistic "needles" and the weird soft square "needles" for filler, are pre-lit, and are usually easier to assemble and store.  I'd recommend pre-lit just because I end up spending longer stringing the lights on our cheap tabletop tree than I do completely decorating our living room tree!

 

Besides the craft stores already mentioned, Target, Home Depot, and Lowe's all have nice trees.  I'd recommend going and looking at some in person if you're not familiar with artificial trees just to get an idea of what's out there in your price range.  If you're just looking for a cheap one, Ikea has one for $50 :)

[Caclcoca]

We bought a pre-lit a few years ago.  The first year was wonderful.  The next year we found a wire that was cut when I folded it up.  Now we string lights on our pre-lit tree. I wouldn't pay extra for a pre-lit again.   We bought the tree at Hobby Lobby during a 50% off sale.  Good luck!

[KrissiK]

We've had our pre-lit one for about 7-8 years now and love it. It may be getting time for a new one, but it's been good. I would just say, don't skimp and get a cheap one. It's worth it to spend a few bucks, especially if you consider the $ you will be saving each year by not buying a real one.

[ChrisB]

We bought ours from treeclassics.com several years ago (similar to a Balsam Hill), and I just love how it looks!  We went with the Real Feel needles because I wanted it to look as real as a fake tree can.  It is also pre-lit, and like the others, it looked great the first few years.  In hindsight, I'd buy unlit and load it up with quality strings of lights because once a string went out on our tree, it was too hard to replace with a good match.  I think ours is around a 6.5' tree, over 1000 lights, and a high tip count--love it!  We get compliments all the time.  Happy tree hunting!

[heartosunshine]

I just bought one from treeclassics.com but it hasn't come yet. I've been looking at trees in the stores and there's some great deals right now so they're selling out of some sizes. It may be different for the smaller size tree that you're looking for, though.

[Spryte]

Balsam Hill here, too.

 

Definitely get pre-lit!

[gardenmom5]

absolutely get pre-lit.

 

[gardenmom5]

We've had our pre-lit one for about 7-8 years now and love it. It may be getting time for a new one, but it's been good. I would just say, don't skimp and get a cheap one. It's worth it to spend a few bucks, especially if you consider the $ you will be saving each year by not buying a real one.

 

and the time you'll save by not having to go find a real one  . . . .