Real Versus Fake: Fun Facts About Christmas Tree Sales in America

Blog: The Tibco Blog

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Many years ago, a right jolly TIBCO data scientist created SPOTFIRE visualizations of Christmas tree sales in America, and now every year at this time we like to unwrap our favorite Christmas tree sales trends, exchange the latest consumer insights, and share what we find with you. Because we know you’ve been good.

Top Tree Producing States

Oregon still produces the most Christmas trees, followed by North Carolina, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Washington. The North Pole has yet to crack the top 50.

Digging a bit deeper, we see that the Midwest likes keeping it real. Both Ohio and Michigan, for example, over-index for total tree-producing counties as a percentage of their total land area.

Oh. If you observed that visualization is a treemap of trees, you earned a little something extra in your stocking.

Artificial vs. Real Tree Sales

You may be surprised to learn that Sears and Roebuck sold the first artificial Christmas tree way back in 1883. But in the battle of “pine versus plastic,” real Christmas tree sales top fake trees every year.

However, sales of artificial trees have been on the rise, with their largest proportional share reaching 44 percent of all tree sales in 2017, followed in 2018 with their all-time high mark for gross sales in the aggregate. Illustrated below in traditional bar and line charts as well as the new Spotfire Mods Spider chart.

You can give your loved ones a brand new car this holiday season or wow them with this knowledge, your choice. The reason why 85 percent of trees on display are artificial, despite the annual pine versus plastic sales differential, is because artificial Christmas trees last an average of 10 years. Real trees are disposed of after the holidays.

Christmas Tree Prices Are Up

Sometimes, you get socks. Prices for both real and fake Christmas trees are up this year. Real Christmas tree prices have doubled since 2015, while prices of artificial Christmas trees have climbed nearly 30 percent in the past year alone. Mean Burgermeisters and supply chain issues are the primary culprit.

Farm to Tabletop

Having gone over the river and through the woods in search of a tree for the holidays, this was a surprise: a whopping 98 percent of real Christmas trees sold in the United States are grown on farms, while 80 percent of artificial trees are manufactured in China.

And did you know the last time a non-fir was chosen for the official White House Christmas tree was back in 1996? It was a blue spruce from Ohio.

The Gift of Insight

Because 2020 was a rare “Black Swan,” a forecast modeled after historical data alone obviously isn’t a best practice and is not advised. Perhaps a custom Seasonality analysis is in store for Santa’s workshop in 2022?

In the meantime, challenge yourself to visualize your world differently and get started customizing and enhancing your analytics apps with Spotfire Mods.

Click here to see more visual insights.

The post Real Versus Fake: Fun Facts About Christmas Tree Sales in America first appeared on The TIBCO Blog.