The questions we actually get asked

Earlier than feels necessary. Design and booking start in late summer and the popular November and December dates go first. By the time most people start thinking about it, the choice is not which date you want but which dates are left. Booking early also means more room to customize the design, because there is time to order anything that is not already in the warehouse.

Installation runs from October through December. Installing in October does not mean the lights are on in October. Everything goes in and is left on a timer that you tell us when to start. Getting the physical work done in mild weather is better for the crew and better for the install.

Yes, and both are included in the price rather than charged separately. We remove everything in January and store your display through the year, labeled, so the following season starts with a phone call instead of a fresh design.

Call and we come out and fix it. In-season service is part of what you have paid for, not a call-out charge. This is most of the practical difference between a professional install and doing it yourself: in December a dark section is our problem.

For holiday lighting the display stays ours and is stored between seasons, which is why the price covers the whole cycle and why the materials are commercial grade rather than something priced to be thrown away. Permanent lighting and landscape lighting are the opposite: those are installed systems that belong to the property.

No, and the difference is visible from the street. Retail strands come in fixed lengths, so a run either falls short or has a loop of surplus, and the spacing is whatever the packet decided. Our strands are cut and clipped to your specific roofline, which is why the lines are straight and even. The lamps and clips are also specified for repeated seasons outdoors rather than one.

Yes. Wreaths, garland and finished greenery, oversized ornaments and statement pieces, fiberglass displays, animatronics, and pre-lit and pre-decorated trees at everything from lobby to town-square scale. Most of it has long lead times, which is another argument for talking in summer. The catalogs page has the full range.

We would rather not, and normally do not have to. Commercial installs are scheduled around trading hours, deliveries and parking, which in practice usually means early mornings, evenings or the shoulder season before you get busy.

They are the two national brands NeedLites operates under, and they split the year. Christmas Decor is the seasonal holiday work: lighting and decor that goes up in the autumn and comes down in January. Nite Time Decor is the year-round side: landscape, architectural, permanent, bistro and event lighting, which is designed and installed in any month. Same company, same crews, same phone number.

No, and that is rather the point. PermaLites365 sits in a low-profile channel mounted into the eave or fascia and color-matched to the trim, so in daylight it reads as part of the roofline. Most of the year the sensible setting is warm white architectural light on a timer. Then it is red and green in December, red white and blue in July, and school colors on a Friday night, all from an app.

Because a landscape lighting system lives outside through an Ohio winter, and that is what decides its lifespan. Solid brass develops a patina and keeps working. Painted aluminum and composite fixtures pit, corrode at the lens seal and let water in, and then need replacing at full labor cost. Brass is more expensive once.

Yes, on any system we install that is specified for it. Smart transformers and controllers give you scheduling, zones, dimming and color from a phone or tablet. On Twinkly Pro installations the whole system can also be managed remotely from anywhere, which for a business or a municipality means a scene change without sending anyone out.

It is often the best time. With the planting cut back and the leaves gone, the structure of a property is visible and nothing is hiding what the lighting actually has to work with. A plan drawn in February and installed in March has a full growing season to settle in.

Greater Cincinnati: Hamilton, Warren, Butler and Clermont counties, and the suburbs across all four. The service area page lists the places we work in most, and there is a longer list beneath it. If you are not sure whether you are inside it, call and ask rather than assuming.

Quotes are free. Use the quote form and tell us what the property is and what you are imagining, or call. For anything beyond a straightforward roofline we will want to see the property, and for landscape lighting that visit happens after dark, because that is the only time the result can be judged honestly.

Yes. Our crews are trained and insured, which matters more than it sounds: emergency rooms see thousands of falls and electrical injuries every December from people putting up their own lights. If someone is going to be on your roof in the cold, it should be someone who does it for a living and carries cover for it.

The business has served Cincinnati since 1995 and has held the local Christmas Decor franchise since 2005. Christmas Decor is a national network of more than 350 franchises across the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico, which is where the products, training and warranties come from. The people on your property are local.