After Christmas Specials

[victory402]

I'm curious as to how this went for some of us.
Last week I went by Lowes and Wal-mart to scope out the potential for today and all the LEDs were already sold out. They did have some incad. 100ct minis though. Home Depot was wiped out of everything.

Anybody do good and where did ya make the deals?

Thanks,
Vic

[wbottomley]

I went to the Walmart in Galax, Va. this morning and picked up a couple cases of 100ct mini's--green, clear, and a few blue. I plan to hit again tonight or tomorrow if anything is left.

As far as LED's go... I'm getting mine from Paul.

[victory402]

Ok, I'm an air head, Who is Paul?

[John]

Paul Sessel see this thread

CDI OFFICIAL PRE ORDER - Christmas Carolina - Your Home For The Holidays


Has the best prices and best service for QUALITY LEDs.

I have over 600 strings from him over the last three years, (only a couple of failures -he quickly replaced) and I'll order another 100 or so strings again for 2010

[mschell]

I made stops at Walmart, 2 Targets and Lowes. Didn't start out till about lunchtime. Only place that had anything much left was Target and they are at 50% off.

Target didn't have that much in way of lights. I did find about 15-20 boxes of blue or blue/white LED icicles (70 ct with 5 mm domes). Since I had seen several houses with just static blue LED icicles and really like the look, I decided to get these to add to my setup for next year.

Mini's were mostly non-existent. I was going to stop by Garden Ridge, but didn't even make it there.

I'm getting in the planning stage already for next year, and will be looking to get more red/green LEDs from Paul @ CDI.

[TGabriel]

Hit local Walmart at 6 this morning and got my blue led icicles 70ct and hit another (Belmont) Walmart and got the white led icicles 70ct for the house. Pick up several boxes of multi color led and red led also. 50% off.
Got the new layout on paper for next year. Will start on it when I start taking down this year.
Just need more controllers and lights.
Thomas

[John]

My Walmart had bunches of LED icicles, but they were half wave.

I'm ordering the C6 full wave icicles from Paul at CDI for next year.

[TGabriel]

I looked at the C6 icicles of Pauls, but I think they are to big for the house. But he will get my order for the M6 and some more C6 led strings.

Thomas

[aproctor]

Walmart in Indian Trail has lots of "driveway" candycanes at noon today. Target in Matthews has a good supply of 17 & 42" LED snowflakes. I bought out the Biglots in Matthews of LEDS but the Raleigh stores had a decent supply as of late Thursday.

I'd suggest buying bulk if you are planning for a mega tree or something requiring many like stands. Else wise, you'll find several of this and several of that.

[duke]

We left early this morning on a road trip to Greensboro and Raleigh. We went to Garden Ridge 50% off sale in Greensboro and spent about $2000.00 Lots of cases LED lights and 4 cases of white wire mini 100 light strings. A few inflatables and LED wire frames. We then went to Home Depot and Lowes in Greensboro a case of the 200 light C6 LED reels. Then we went to The Holiday Light Store in Raleigh and when we walked in told them we were from Pilot Mountain, they said we know who you are. They have a lot of nice wireframes. http://www.theholidaylightstore.com/
We bought a case of lighted Hyacinth Flower Lights for our Florida Chirstmas area.


By this time we were running out of space, our Ford Explorer was packed full. It was a 2 hour drive back just in time to turn the lights on. Bigger display next year.

[wbottomley]

By this time we were running out of space, our Ford Explorer was packed full. It was a 2 hour drive back just in time to turn the lights on. Bigger display next year.

Larry... that's a real decorator!

[Jack Stevens]

I was at the WalMart in Siler City when they opened at 6:10 AM; got 4 full cases of mostly clear, red, green, and amber; some random other colors were mixed in those. Also a few other random boxes, so probably about 11,000 minis in all.

I'm still waiting for more price drop in LED's; I can pay for a lot of power for the cost difference of $1.19 a box post-Christmas LED's vs ~$4.00 per box LED's of unknown if half wave/full wave/quick burn-out on dimming.

We also went to the WalMart in Asheboro; got there about 9, wish we had gone there first.

[Al in Raleigh]

I bought nothing. I actually enjoyed buying nothing this year. Deb couldn't believe it. The reason is:

1) John convinced me to go pro LED on a few things. The LEDs MUST be full-wave and must last longer than 3 years. That is my criteria. I want to make these display items last me a long time without changing burned out lamps every single stinking night.
2) I have a ton of stuff in my garage and storage areas that needs to be utilized. I am really not sure how much crap is storage. I guarantee you I will soon.
3) I have a ton of crap in my display. At what point do I need more crap? If I don't throttle back it will be a problem. It throttled back some this morning.
4) This is my year off. My year off includes the sales too. You guys might call me crazy but my sanity is worth a few dollars.

Having said all this junk above, I plan to buy the stuff I need when it is 75-90% off. It will go into storage and will be categorized, cataloged, and utilized at some point in the future.

The TASL folks will hear my dribble in person in the future. I have learned a lot by taking a year off.

Al

[Ryan]

Hi all,
Newb here,
I am looking for information on purchasing lights in larger quantities?
What would you call a fair price for 100 count LED or incandescent on 50’ green if you were willing to buy 100+ strands? (per strand)
This would mainly be for my neighborhood common area and to beef up my animated display.
I am thinking $3.00 for incandescent and $7.00 for LED shipped??? (Any thoughts)
Also any insight into bulk purchasing would be much appreciated. EG: timing for best deals, calling V’s online order, budget setting, etc.
Thanks again,
Ryan

[John]

If you want a QUALITY LED, see the link in post #4 in this thread.

If you want a half-wave, flickering, subject to corrision and early failure LED, then hit the retail stores right now.

Just my opinions regarding LEDs, (based on my experience)