Steve Mellon, Post-Gazette
	At left is a branch from an artificial California baby redwood from Balsam Hill Christmas Tree Co. At right is standard artificial tree branch, with the needles clipped straight across. RELATED COVERAGE A faux aroma to complement a faux fir

When Rich Martini opened his Chicago Christmas tree showroom this year, his exterminator said he would have to charge extra to take care of the live trees.

Except there weren't any.

Mr. Martini's Omaha-based company, Holiday Bright Lights, makes artificial trees for the upscale catalog firm Hammacher Schlemmer. His goal is to create a fake tree that can't be distinguished from the real thing, and, if the exterminator is any judge, he's succeeding.

Technology used to be content to mass produce affordable consumer goods without worrying too much about their verisimilitude (think Insulbrick). But today, it often strives to simulate reality, and Christmas isn't immune to the phenomenon.

So there are companies dedicated to selling you fake trees that look as though you cut them down yesterday. And because no one has perfected plastic that exudes a long-lasting pine scent, there are other companies that are happy to give you the synthetic equivalent in sprays, candles and oils.

The difference between a run-of-the-mill tree and a high-end model that looks almost real shows up in the needles.

It is there, in the shape, configuration and coloring of the tiny fronds, that you will see the contrast between a $100 tree and a $500 tree, said Tom Harman, chief executive officer of Balsam Hill Christmas Tree Co., of Redwood City, Calif., which makes trees with prices ranging from $280 to $2,300.

Balsam Hill. Hammacher Schlemmer and the upscale home products company, Frontgate, of Cincinnati, dominate the ritzier end of the artificial tree market. Together, the three provide 5 percent or less of the 9 million artificial Christmas trees sold each year in the United States, but they set the standard for trying to make fake look as real as possible.

And while live trees still dominate the U.S. market -- nearly 33 million were sold last year -- sales of artificial trees have risen at a faster rate over the past five years.

Most of those have been mass-market artificial trees, whose needles are made by slitting large sheets of polyvinyl chloride (PVC). The resulting fronds are thin and flat, Mr. Harman said, and the cheaper the tree, the more the needles tend to be a dark green monochrome not found in nature.

The high-end companies make their needles out of multihued polyethylene (PE), and each "species," Noble fir or Vermont spruce or Scotch pine, has its own molds for the six-inch needle segments.

Hand painting, to add a touch of blue to the underside of the needles and brown to the stems, is also standard in the more expensive trees, said Mr. Martini, of Holiday Bright Lights.

Frontgate, whose trees range from $295 to $995, offers simulated bark on the trunks for an added touch of realism, but the other two companies reject that frill. "When the trunk is a steel pole wrapped with lights, you don't want people to see the trunk," Mr. Harman said.

If you imagined these trees are higher priced because they're made in the United States, you're in for a disappointment.

The three companies' trees are made in China, as are 85 percent of all artificial trees.

Besides the painting, most of the assembly of artificial trees is done by hand, from attaching the needles to the branches to stringing the lights so the wires don't show, and doing that at American labor rates would make them cost prohibitive, the tree makers said.

It's hard to find an artificial tree at any price t hese days that comes without lights, Mr. Harman added. For taller trees that come in three or four sections, there are electrical connectors between each segment.

Making a tree that looks real is still as much an art as a science, the executives said.

For instance, even with his most authentic-looking tree, the Vermont white spruce, Mr. Harman uses some of the cheaper PVC needles on the inside to help shield the trunk.

And his Scotch pine does not mimic the bushy tree found in the woods, he said, but the carefully pruned version found on a tree farm.

After exporting samples of the trees he wanted to simulate to China, Mr. Martini said, he developed "five-finger," "three finger" and "two-finger" molds for his needle tips so he could vary them along the trunk for a more realistic appearance.

Both men are proud of how lifelike their trees are.

To get Hammacher Schlemmer's business, Mr. Martini said, "I sent them an e-mail with pictures and said one of these is real and one of them is fake, and they couldn't tell the difference."

At his showroom in California, Mr. Harman said, "people are constantly coming in and trying to smell that Vermont spruce."

Because fake trees are designed to last for 10, 20 or 30 years, some surveys show they now make up a majority of the trees that are displayed each season.

Still, the National Christmas Tree Association, which promotes real trees, is optimistic about the future of the live tree industry, spokesman Rick Dungey said, especially because its surveys of Generation Y members, who are between the ages of 6 and 29 this year, have shown "they are more like their grandparents than their parents. They prefer family traditions and environmentally friendly products."

When it comes to the expensive artificial trees, Mr. Dungey said, "I can think of a lot of things I'd rather spend $1,200 on than a giant green toilet bowl brush, but that's just me."

Mr. Harman responded mildly.

He said: "The main thing you're giving up with an artificial tree is the smell. But the biggest advantage is, you don't have the hassle of going out and getting the tree. Our trees are great for busy young professionals or baby boomers.

"The lights are also a huge thing. Everyone knows when you take your lights out from last year you're going to spend half an hour untangling them from the previous year. And you don't have to water the tree, so if you go away and visit family for part of the holidays, you don't come back and find all the needles have fallen off."

The other feature that distinguishes the more expensive trees, Mr. Martini said, is the quality of the prestrung lights. There are generally more of them, sometimes twice as many per foot as on a midrange tree, and, in his case, they are designed to last longer.

All Christmas tree lights now contain shunts, so that if a bulb burns out, the current will keep flowing to the other bulbs in the string.

In a standard string, that means the remaining bulbs get a little extra current, which causes them to wear out faster. In his trees, though, Mr. Martini says, each bulb contains a tiny chip, and if a bulb burns out, the chip absorbs the same amount of electricity the bulb did, preventing the other bulbs from getting extra current.

It's these kinds of details that Mr. Martini obsesses over as he strives to make a premier artificial tree.

He realizes he's hopelessly single-minded.

"Most guys have pictures of cars or beautiful women in their offices. I have pictures of trees."

He also recently became engaged.

His fiance's name? Noelle.