There is one place in the Tar Heel State that celebrates the winter holiday season like perhaps nowhere else. McAdenville ā population 900, about 10 miles west of Charlotte Douglas International Airport ā becomes āChristmas Town USAā during December and holds a month-long celebration.
Even if you donāt party that hard where you live, thereās no doubt holiday season is in full swing. At BetCarolina.com, where the best NC sports betting promos are available all year, we were curious if locals in the Tar Heel state prefer real or artificial Christmas trees. Using Google Trends, we compared the search interest scores for āreal Christmas treesā and āartificial Christmas treesā for a period from Nov. 30, 2023, to Dec. 25, 2023. We filtered the results to only include North Carolina.
Type | Score |
Artificial Tree | 10 |
Real Tree | 9 |
Itās a close contest, but residents in the home of North Carolina sportsbooks are looking for information on artificial trees a bit more often than real ones, according to search volume results during the time we researched.
The North Carolina Christmas Tree Association website, at ncchristmastrees.com, has a list breaking down wholesale farms and āchoose and cutā farms for those seeking a real tree for the holidays. The website lists nine species of trees, plus an āotherā category, under the choose-and-cut section.
The association also boasts that a North Carolina Fraser fir has been picked as the official White House Christmas tree 16 times, including this year.
Still, artificial varieties barely win out for internet searches in the Tar Heel State, perhaps because they can be stored away and quickly reassembled the next year. Plus, unlike real trees that shed their needles, the artificial type only sheds something if you hang a lot of tinsel from it (cat owners know too well the importance of strategy when they hang tinsel).
Metro | Type | Pct. of Preference |
Asheville | Real Tree | 51% |
Charlotte | Artificial Tree | 56% |
Greensboro-Winston-Salem | Real Tree | 52% |
Raleigh-Durham | Artificial Tree | 59% |
Florence | Artificial Tree | 100% |
As for metro areas in the state, we measured data in five of them and theyāre pretty well split in their preference for real vs. artificial trees.
Asheville and Greensboro-Winston-Salem both went for the real deal by a very small margin. Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham both chose the artificial option. And Florence was unanimous in preferring artificial trees based on search volume, perhaps based on a small sample.
To continue the festive spirit of the season, check out North Carolinaās favorite Thanksgiving side dishes at BetCarolina.com.
USA Today Network photo by Michael Clevenger/Courier Journal
Author
Jim Tomlin has more than 30 years of experience at such publications as the Tampa Bay Times, FanRag, Saturday Down South and Saturday Tradition. He now lends his expertise in sports, betting and the intersection of those two industries to BetCarolina.com, among other sites.
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