Ordered a Christmas tree and was despatched straight away, delivered the following day. Lots of updates on delivery time. Tree was beautiful and had lots of compliments on it

Visited Cornwall last summer and had an amazing time. While we were there our friends introduced us to Whistlefish 🥰 I absolutely love everything! The cards, the wrap, the boxes, the offers, the ethos. So much so that I have bought an index folder and organised my cards for 2026! Obviously I could only buy for birthdays in advance, so I still love perusing the options when I need an ‘extra’ card or two! 

We have ordered many products from Balsam Hill and so review with solid experience. Summary is - if you want something that is purely decorative and isn't powered in any way - you're probably going to be okay. But when things go wrong, they will not make things right.

First things first is that their products all are of moderate quality - as long as you're after decoration and not function, you will probably be okay. Probably.

Their lit garlands EAT batteries like no tomorrow. 8xAA batteries per garland, and you'll be changing them every couple of days if you use them on the maximum timer (8hrs on, 16 hours off). Over Christmas period this works out to be around 24-48 batteries per garland. Additionally the wires are very flimsy and all of our 4 garlands have a fault where many of the LEDs don't light up or light up very dimly.

We have taken very good care of all of our decorations, returning them into their original packaging every year after simply hanging on the wall for a month.

We also bought one of their lit wooden animated swiss scenes at £329. It looks beautiful but again, function falls short. The motor that drives the animation is louder than our dishwasher and at times louder than the washing machine. Not something you want turned on for 8 hours a day. You can't turn the motor off without also turning off the LEDs and so you either have a very loud motor and the lights + animation. Or just the wooden decoration.

At £329 you would expect a quiet motor for something driving something so small and light. Not to mention that this is made in china, so they're probably turning a profit of £300 per item....it would be a couple of quid to put a quieter motor on each of these.

Then there's the customer service. Initially they offered a replacement on the animated scene, which we accepted, expecting it to be a one-off fault, but when the 2nd one arrived and it was exactly the same we asked for a refund which they denied due to it being 4 days outside of their warrant period of 30 days.

I've spent thousands with Balsam Hill and they wouldn't even offer a refund for the sake of 4 days. Stunned.

Finally - we ordered a tree topper from them for £89 and after sitting on the tree untouched for a month it broke as we took it off in January.

My final conclusion is that although for many years we've been satisfied with Balsam Hill - this year we've wasted over £400 and their service after the fact is awful.

You know how most decent companies allow you to return Christmas purchases for a longer period to allow for the Christmas period? not Balsam Hill...purveyors of Christmas Decorations. So if you make the mistake of buying from them - be sure to unpack and pressure test your purchase....I'm sure you don't want to be setting up your Christmas Tree in July, but if you're buying out-of-season then I'm sure you also don't want to be stuck with a faulty tree in December when it's too late to do anything about it and you're near to £1,000 in the hole.

Also UK customers should beware especially - they are based in Ireland and do not share their UK address.

No-one does it better than this company!

These are the original lapland letters company and been using them for years and years. There's something special and extra magical with these letters. They feel naturally written for the kids and the extra bits you get with the other packs they sell are really nice. The branding is beautifully done so that it feels like it's actually come from Santa. My kids absolutely love getting these. It really adds to the magical Christmas experience. 

Just bought another personalised planter for my Sisters 70th Birthday - quality size and service has been absolutely amazing.  Definetely use again - Abbey has been so helpful.

Fantastic service, fast delivery, wonderful range of products 
Fabulous customer service and communication throughout 

I ordered a Christmas gift from The Handmade Christmas Co.

I was not satisfied with the product and contacted my bank regarding the issue. My bank (Barclays) processed a refund on my behalf.

After this refund, the company used my card details again without my knowledge or consent and charged additional amounts to my card.

Barclays confirmed that this was an unauthorised transaction and refunded the money to me.

I am very concerned that my card details were stored and misused. I would advise other customers to be extremely careful when shopping from this website.

Yes it was easy to choose and make life easier to plan for Christmas 

Excellent service as always & good quality products. Always receive things quickly without paying extra.

A beautiful tree and great service & delivery

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