Choosing a good Christmas tree isn't as simple as picking the biggest one and dragging it home. Various factors such as how they are grown, age and price all play into which tree is best for you. While propping up a plastic tree every year is as easy as A B C, it simply can't compare to the essence and feel a live tree can add to a room during these festive periods.
Types of Christmas trees
Christmas trees are grown in various ways that will drastically affect their life cycle, the two main types being cut and potted.
Cut: This tree is your typical and most common type of Christmas tree, grown in a field and cut at the base to be sold as a Christmas tree, perfect for a single use.
Potted: These trees can last up to 2-3 years for the frugal buyer who is really looking to get the most out of the tree. They will require a lot of attention but can be used multiple times; you'll just have to find somewhere to store it when it's not in use.
Get what's right for you
Clearly the best option for most buyers would be the cut tree. It requires little maintenance, aside from watering it every couple of days, and it can simply be recycled when it starts to die.
A potted tree is vastly more expensive and will become somewhat of a long-term investment as, like most plants, it will need to be watered every so often for the entire duration of its life cycle. It's a time-consuming commitment for a tree that's only going to come out once a year.
Freshness of the tree
If you're getting a cut tree, you'll want to make sure that the one you take home is the freshest one on the lot. You can check this by asking the retailer whether their goods are sold just once, at the start of the selling season, or at various times throughout the season. You'll want to avoid the retailer that buys all of their stock at the start of the season, as you're more likely to purchase a tree with not much of a life cycle left.
A good way to check for freshness is to simply look at it. Every cut tree, no matter how fresh, will have some brown needles somewhere. You'll want to look for the tree with the least amount of dead needles, to ensure your tree makes it past Christmas.
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