A “Merry Christmas” makeover to end the year with*, looking at a Statista graph of Christmas tree sales in the US from 2004 to 2016. The original is a nice simple bar chart, which clearly shows the breakdown between sales of real and fake Christmas trees in America. It’s a little hard to see the actual proportions and that’s one thing I wanted to hit in my makeover.

A number of the community’s submissions took the angle that fake trees are re-usable, and so whilst less are sold than real trees, the actual number out there in people’s homes and business might be higher. We have a real tree that is still re-usable in our house. I bought it nearly ten years ago as a small potted fir. It lives in the garden most of the time and then comes in every other Christmas or so. Why not every Christmas? Well I absolutely love the tree, it’s convenience and the re-usability. But my partner occasionally wins the debate and we get a larger cut tree. I guess there is a place for, and joy to be shared from, all sorts of tree’s at Christmas … not so different from other aspects of life really.

Anyway below is my makeover. As ever it is available on Tableau Public too here.

* Post script: why did I asterisk ending the year with this viz? Well I set myself a goal to complete all 52 this year but am 1 short on 51. Darn it, so close! Hopefully I’ll squeeze one more makeover in and hit my goal. Well done to those that have done all 52 – a massive effort. And of course a huge thanks and shout out to the organisers – Andy and Eva. 2018 Makeover Monday looks to be even more exciting. If you’re considering joining, or maybe wavering, then my simple advice is to get amongst it! The community is really supportive and if you heed the advice and pointers that you’ll hear, then you’ll likely see some real growth and learn heaps. On top of that if you participate most weeks then you’ll build up a great portfolio of visualisations.

Happy new year everyone!