We bought from Balsam Hill too. The flip tree is so easy and rolls into a closet for storage.
I think this might the 9th year of this tree and it’s starting to show some age. For what it cost I was hoping to get many years out of it. There was one section that didn’t light and I can’t find any reason for it after reading the troubleshooting tips. I ended up adding a string of lights so I could move on and will look a little deeper when I take it down. I also noticed a couple branches that are starting to sag a bit. I wonder how long they are expected to last??
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Abies or Picea for us, too! Not Pinus. Your tree looks great in photos! 
/Botany nerd here. 
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Fake trees are supposed to last “forever,” but obviously they don’t. Apparently, it takes 8 years for a fake tree to become more environmentally friendly and have less impact on the environment than 8 comparable in size real trees! 
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I like the idea of decorating a live potted tree and planting after the holidays, if you live where that is possible. If we ever stay in Maine over the holidays, I’ll decorate one of the pines outside and enjoy it from inside the cabin which is too small to host any reasonable-size tree.
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We have bought our fake trees when we saw them at good prices—sometimes just before and sometimes after Christmas. We keep replacing them with smaller ones. Our current one is about 4’. S bought if for like $15 or so, pre-lit from CVs right around Christmas. We have bought from Macy’s & CVs. My sister bought a pre-lit one from Costco one year, before Christmas. She has several trees.
We got our (overly large - maybe 12 foot high?) artificial Christmas tree about 10 years ago on Craigslist from a couple that was downsizing. It was a steal (like $350?) and they threw in all these lovely oversized ornaments (which really added a nice scale to an extra large tree). So I think that we are pretty environmentally neutral…?
That being said, I’m ready to downsize now and sell the tree to a young family LOL. It takes almost two full days to assemble, put on lights, and add all the ornaments/ribbons, sprays. My daughter still wants it up, though, so we’ll see!
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We ordered our most recent one online after Christmas. The stores are pretty picked over even now. In fact both Target and Walmart have exactly zero trees…none at all.
I did see a good selection at Lowe’s and Home Depot earlier in the month.
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Yipp-eae yipp-eae yay for botany nerds! That’s all I got for a botany pun. Sad. 
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If we ever get a fake tree it will likely be Balsam Hill, on sale. Their trees look pretty good/close to real to me.
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For those with Balsam Hill trees, are they pre-lit? I was showing H some trees on their website, and he didn’t think pre-lit was a good idea because once the lights go bad, the tree is useless. Or hasn’t that been an issue?
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You can get either - with or without lights, and you can pick white, colored or both in some cases.
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We have a pre lit tree. Half of the lights don’t work. I put more strings of lights on the tree to fill in.
I didn’t put up a tree this year. Or last. No visitors, we travel.
It’s not putting up the tree but taking it down. I do put up my other Christmas decorations just not a tree.
My mil throws out her tree once the lights stop working. I think she gets a new tree every 3 years or so.
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We’ve had 2 Balsam Hill trees. By the time the first one had reached the End of its life, we were lighting 2 large swatches of it with external lights. I actually felt a twinge of nostalgia when we bought our new one 3 years ago (much easier to assemble—no extra plug-ins). I thought helping the old tree out with the extra lights was in the true spirit of Christmas! This new one is great, with every light option you could want (white, colored, steady, flashing).
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We bought our last one in 2006 when we moved into our house. Our fancy store has a Christmas in July sale, so they put them 50% off. I had no idea there were even brands of trees.
The prelit part started to die after maybe after 10 years, so I added lights on top. A few years later, more went out, so I clipped them all off and added my own.
The sucker is so big that it ruined the box pretty quick. I have to stuff it in two GIANT bags. They look like body bags. I can easily fit stretching out in them and I’m 5-10.
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We’ve had much larger trees when our kids were younger, a few real trees on occasion. But, have settled on a 4 1/2 foot artificial tree with prelit colored lights that can fit on a tabletop. We will be downsizing so I’m sure we’ll be sticking with a small tree. Lights have always been colored and the ornaments are a real combination of vintage, traditional, kid related, travel related, sentimental, etc. We went to a Minor League hockey game last night and they were giving out ornaments to the first 500 people, so now we have a hockey ornament on our tree!
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We passed down our first artificial tree to our D…it is 30 years old.
We bought our current tree at Michael’s the week after New Years at 90% off for $40.
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Or other seasonal decorations please…
Happy Holidays CC community and healthy and prosperous New Years!!
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