Storing an artificial Christmas tree for a ten-year life

A well-made artificial tree lasts seven to ten years. Most that fail early were crushed into a loft in January, and the fix costs £20.

Taking it down

Remove every decoration and the topper, then the lights if they are a separate set, winding them onto a reel or a piece of card. Unplug the sections of a pre-lit tree and coil each section’s lead back to its own plug. Lift the sections off from the top, and fold the hinged branches upward against the trunk with both hands, working from the bottom ring to the top, so the tips lie along the branch rather than bending across it. A flocked tree should be fully dry first; if the room has been humid, leave it a day.

What to store it in

The original box lasts two or three years and then splits at the corners. A storage bag with handles lasts the life of the tree: a 6ft hinged tree fits a large bag, a 7ft or 7.5ft tree the extra large, and an 8ft tree needs two bags or one per section. Put the stand, the spare bulbs and the instructions in the bag so nothing goes missing. Bags are listed under stands and skirts.

Where to keep it

Somewhere dry with a stable temperature: a cupboard, under a bed, a garage that does not flood, a dry loft. A loft that is damp in winter and hot in summer is the single biggest cause of flocking going yellow and PVC going brittle. Store the bag flat or standing, never with weight on top of it, and never with the branches compressed by a strap.

Lights

Coil a separate set loosely round your hand and the elbow and put it in its own bag; a set stuffed in with the tree is the one that is tangled next year. On a pre-lit tree check that no lead is trapped in a hinge before the section goes in the bag; a crushed lead is the usual reason a section fails.

Next year

Stand the sections and fluff the tips outward from the trunk, bottom ring first. Twenty minutes of fluffing is what makes a stored tree look new; a tree put up straight from the bag looks like a stored tree.