Every January, somewhere in this city, a person drags a dead tree down four flights of stairs and leaves a trail of brown needles on every landing. Their neighbors know exactly who did it.
There is a better way, and there are three of them.
Option 1: put it out with your compost
New York City collects Christmas trees as part of weekly curbside composting. You do not have to wait for a special day anymore. Your tree goes out on your regular compost or recycling day in January and it gets turned into compost and mulch for city parks.
Two rules that get people:
- Strip it completely. Every ornament, every strand of lights, the tinsel, and the stand. Anything not tree gets the whole tree rejected.
- No plastic bag. Do not wrap it. A bagged tree is trash, not compost.
Check nyc.gov/sanitation for your building’s compost day.
Option 2: take it to Mulchfest
NYC Parks runs Mulchfest every year, from just after Christmas into the second week of January. You bring your tree to a drop-off site in a park near you, and on Chipping Weekend they run it through a chipper while you watch, which is genuinely a good time with a kid.
You can take a bag of the mulch home. It is good on a houseplant, or spread around the street tree in front of your building, which could probably use it.
Sites and dates are posted at nycgovparks.org each December.
Option 3: do not carry it down at all
This is the one we do.
We collect trees across Manhattan, Brooklyn, and Queens in January and take them to be mulched. You do not touch it, you do not sweep the stairwell, and nobody in your building watches you do it.
Removal runs $120 to $480, priced by the height of the tree and by whether it is still decorated. Yes, we will take it decorated. We will strip it for you. That is what the higher end of that range is.
Book removal in our shop, or call 646-470-6326.
When to take it down
Whenever you want. Nobody here is going to tell you the tree has to be down by Epiphany.
The practical answer is that a well-watered Fraser fir will hold up through the first or second week of January, and it starts telling you when it is done. Needles that snap instead of bending, a trunk that has stopped drinking, a smell that has gone flat.
One safety note that is worth the sentence: a dry tree is genuinely flammable. Once it stops taking up water, unplug the lights and get it out within the week.
The trick for the stairwell
If you are carrying it down yourself, get a tree removal bag before you take the ornaments off. You slide it up over the tree from the base, cinch it, and the needles stay inside instead of on every landing between you and the sidewalk. They cost a few dollars and they are the difference between a five-minute job and an hour with a broom.
Or, again, we will just come get it.
Related: How to care for your Christmas tree and keep it fresh all season