Can these converts sell you a fake before you buy a Christmas tree?

Last year, Charlene Truong Launer, a social media content creator, bought a real Christmas tree from a vendor on a Manhattan sidewalk.

Mrs. Launer, 29, and her husband carried the tree 15 minutes to their TriBeCa apartment and spent hours setting it up. “I was so excited,” she said.

However, the next morning it all came crashing down – literally. “Our Christmas tree was down and all our decorations were broken,” she said. “I was so devastated.”

They put it back together, but the tree headaches didn’t end there. “The whole time we had the tree, the pine needles were all over the ground,” she said. Ms Launer added that when it was time to dispose of the tree, the collection team had scattered pine needles everywhere after dragging the tree from her apartment building.

She promised never again.

Instead of buying a Christmas tree in person this year, she ordered a fake ten-foot fir tree from Home Depot. “It arrived in a box, I opened it and it was perfect,” she said. “It even came with lighting.”

Ms. Launer considers herself a convert: “It looks real,” she added. “I love it.”

She is hardly alone. According to poll from the American Christmas Tree Association77 percent of people who have at least one Christmas tree this year will go for a fake. The association found that people like how easy fake trees are to set up, that no maintenance is required and that the trees look consistent and beautiful throughout the holidays.

Ben Frumin of Wirecutter, owned by The New York Times, said his guide to the best artificial Christmas trees was one of the most read product reviews last month – from a catalog of more than 1,000 reviews.

But the popularity of fake trees isn’t necessarily great news for the environment: Bill Lindberg, a horticulture expert at Michigan State University, said there are environmental and economic benefits to having a real tree. “Artificial trees are made of plastic and ultimately end up in landfill. Real trees are renewable resources and can be crushed and put back on the ground,” he said.

But if you choose an artificial tree, he says it is best to use the same tree over and over again. “There was a research has been done that has been compared the environmental impact of a real tree versus a fake tree,” he said. “It showed that if you kept your artificial tree for eight years, you would actually start to break even.” If you keep it longer, he added, “you could help the environment.”

Other factors also determine the popularity of fake trees: Some people like how cost-effective it is to buy one tree that can be reused for decades. “Our real six-foot Christmas tree cost $300, which would be an expensive annual tradition,” Ms. Launer said. “Our fake one cost $500, and we can put it in storage for next year.”

There’s also the fact that many fake trees now look remarkably real. The Grand Duchess of Home Depot, an 8-foot artificial balsam fir that comes with 250 color-changing lights, became known as “the viral Christmas tree” on TikTok. The company said it had already sold out for the season.

Emily Scheiner, 36, who works in marketing, didn’t object when her boyfriend insisted on buying an artificial tree for their SoHo apartment this year. “He’s a neat freak, so the thought of needles falling in the apartment drove him crazy,” she said.

Ms. Scheiner, who is Jewish, did not grow up with a Christmas tree, so she was amazed at the many options for artificial ones. The couple chose an 8-foot artificial Douglas fir from the National Tree Company. She said her dog, Bernie, had embraced it too. “We have to keep him from eating it.”

Even people who have been surrounded by real Christmas trees all their lives are going crazy this year.

Lillian Greene, 22, grew up on a Christmas tree farm in Boone, NC. “Every year I got to choose my own tree and cut it down,” she said.

But now that she lives in Los Angeles, where she works as a youth counselor, the experience was different. “They have pre-cut ones at the grocery store, but I thought, what was the point if I didn’t get the full Christmas farm experience?”

She bought a six-foot artificial tree from Amazon, which “felt a bit like a family betrayal,” she said. “I already miss some things about having a real tree, like the smell.” She also noticed that the fake tree was a bit “too perfect,” adding, “Real trees would have some dry spots where there are no leaves.”

But she enjoyed the fact that there was no cleaning or maintenance. “I think as long as I live in LA, I’m going to stick with the fake,” she said.

Her sister, Laurel Greene, 20, who still lives in North Carolina, even got one.