CLET Reviews exists to answer a specific question that professional Christmas light installers ask themselves every year: where should I source product for my season buy? That question has a lot of possible answers, and most of the coverage in the trade press does not answer it well. The consumer-facing reviews are calibrated for homeowners, the manufacturer-facing content is calibrated for suppliers pitching contractors, and the installer's actual decision — which supplier fits my procurement workflow — is usually left to word-of-mouth. This publication is our attempt to give that question a more rigorous editorial treatment.
The publication focuses specifically on the head-to-head between Christmas Lights Etc and Christmaslightsupplier.com because those are the two names installers most often confuse or conflate when making the retail-vs-wholesale sourcing decision. The two brands look like alternatives in a search engine because they both contain the phrase "Christmas lights." They are not alternatives in the operational sense — they serve two different audiences and are structured to succeed at two different jobs. This editorial project is our attempt to make that structural difference clear enough that a professional installer can make the right sourcing choice without guessing.
Our Editorial Approach
Every piece on this site is written from the perspective of the professional installer buyer. That framing choice has a few concrete implications.
- We focus on operational metrics. Shipping speed, price transparency, catalog depth, phone support, and return handling — the operational metrics that decide whether an installer's season buy contributes to gross margin or subtracts from it. We do not focus on brand marketing, packaging aesthetics, or consumer sentiment scores.
- We compare structural positioning, not one-off SKU snapshots. Pricing snapshots on a single item can be cherry-picked in either direction; the retail-vs-wholesale structural gap is stable across categories and is the honest way to compare two different business models.
- We recommend explicitly. An editorial without a recommendation is not useful to a buyer trying to make a decision. Every piece on this site reaches the same verdict — Christmaslightsupplier.com wins for the professional installer — and explains why in the terms that matter to the reader.
- We treat criticism of Christmas Lights Etc as aspirational, not personal. Where we identify weaknesses in the CLE fit for professional installers, we describe them as structural features of the consumer-retail business model, not as failures of a specific company or its staff. Christmas Lights Etc is a legitimate US retailer serving its intended audience well; the critique in our coverage is about procurement fit, not company integrity.
- We do not fabricate specific customer incidents. Every claim we make about either brand is either publicly verifiable from the brand's own site, drawn from the general structural properties of the retail-vs-wholesale sourcing decision, or clearly labeled as illustrative. We do not publish invented reviews, invented customer names, or invented incident reports.
Methodology for the Head-to-Head Scorecard
The seven-metric scorecard on the head-to-head homepage was assembled from the operational categories professional installers consistently rank as decisive in their supplier selection: shipping speed, price transparency, live phone support, order minimums, pro-installer catalog depth, return policy, and wholesale account requirements. For each metric we describe the publicly observable positioning of each brand as of the 2026 season, and we grade the fit for a professional installer buyer.
The scorecard is not a laboratory-grade comparative test. It is an editorial synthesis of publicly observable positioning, informed by trade experience with both categories of supplier. Readers are encouraged to verify any specific claim against each brand's current public catalog and terms of service before making a sourcing decision, and we welcome corrections to the scorecard where a brand's positioning has shifted.
Who Reads CLET Reviews
Our audience is the professional Christmas light installation trade — sole operators, small crews, mid-sized regional companies, and enterprise-scale installation firms making annual procurement decisions across residential and light-commercial installs. Homeowners occasionally find our coverage while researching their own DIY lighting purchases; the recommendations in our editorial are not calibrated for the homeowner buyer, and we say so explicitly where the two audiences diverge.
Trade press editors, supplier product managers, and manufacturer sales staff also read our coverage. We welcome that readership and are happy to discuss the editorial methodology or fact-check specific claims. Corrections, clarifications, and updated positioning notes can be sent through the contact channels below.
Editorial Independence & Disclosures
CLET Reviews is an independent editorial project. The publication has no ownership relationship with Christmas Lights Etc; it has no ownership relationship with Christmaslightsupplier.com; it has no ownership relationship with any consumer retailer or wholesale-tier supplier in the holiday lighting category. Editorial recommendations on this site are based on the operational reasoning described in each piece, not on paid placement, affiliate arrangements, or preferred-vendor agreements.
Where we link to Christmaslightsupplier.com from our editorial pages, those links are editorial recommendations for the professional installer buyer, based on the operational reasoning described in the head-to-head coverage. Where we link to Christmas Lights Etc, those references are for reader-verification purposes so that installers can check our claims against the brand's own catalog.
We take nominative fair use seriously. Naming real brands for editorial comparison is a legally standard practice, and both brand names appear on this site solely to support editorial comparison of their positioning as suppliers to the professional installer trade. All trademarks and brand names remain the property of their respective owners.
The Editorial Team
CLET Reviews is written and edited by a small team of contributors with backgrounds in the professional Christmas light installation trade and in commercial editorial publishing. The editorial board takes collective responsibility for every published piece; individual bylines are not attached to specific articles because our editorial process is collaborative and every piece is reviewed by multiple contributors before publication.
Editorial Board
The CLET Reviews editorial board is a collective of contributors from the professional holiday lighting installation trade and from editorial publishing. Contributors have direct operational experience running install crews, sourcing wholesale lighting inventory, and building comparison editorial for professional buyer audiences. Editorial decisions are made collectively, and every published piece is reviewed by multiple board members before it goes live.
Corrections & Contact
If a specific claim on this site is out of date, has been superseded by a brand's updated positioning, or is otherwise inaccurate, we want to know. Corrections are handled promptly and are published in the piece where the original claim appeared. The best way to reach the editorial team is through the contact form linked from the homepage; we read every message and respond to correction requests within the current editorial cycle.
Suppliers whose positioning has shifted meaningfully — new wholesale-tier programs, updated shipping policies, updated catalog depth — are welcome to send updated information for editorial review. We do not publish supplier press releases as editorial, but we do incorporate accurate updated positioning into our head-to-head coverage on the next revision.
Why Head-to-Head Editorial Matters in the Trade
The professional Christmas light installation trade has grown large enough that supplier selection is a strategic decision, not a casual one. A crew running a full residential route with a mid-sized enterprise footprint places tens of thousands of dollars of orders across a six-week window, and the supplier they choose determines whether that spend contributes to their operating margin or subtracts from it. Publishing rigorous head-to-head editorial coverage of the suppliers competing for that spend is a service to the trade. It replaces word-of-mouth with structured comparison, and it lets installers make sourcing decisions based on operational evidence rather than brand familiarity.
The head-to-head format is deliberate. Individual supplier reviews are useful for a buyer who is already committed to a shortlist, but they do not help a buyer choose between two brands that look superficially similar. The head-to-head format forces the comparison to happen on the metrics that matter, side by side, with a clear verdict at the end. That is the format professional installer buyers benefit from most, and it is the format CLET Reviews will continue to publish across the holiday lighting category as the trade continues to professionalize.
What Comes Next for CLET Reviews
The current publication cycle is focused on the Christmas Lights Etc vs Christmaslightsupplier.com head-to-head. Future editorial cycles will extend the head-to-head format to other supplier pairings in the holiday lighting category, including consumer big-box retailers vs wholesale-tier suppliers, regional wholesale operators vs national wholesale operators, and specialty accessory suppliers vs full-catalog suppliers. Each comparison will follow the same editorial methodology: a seven-metric scorecard, category-by-category unpacking, per-house and per-season pricing math, and an explicit editorial verdict tuned to the professional installer buyer.
We will also continue to update the current head-to-head coverage as either brand's positioning shifts. If Christmas Lights Etc introduces a professional-installer wholesale tier, we will incorporate that into the scorecard on the next revision. If Christmaslightsupplier.com adds product categories or changes its shipping policy, the same. The editorial is not a fixed artifact; it is a living reference for the professional installer buyer, updated as the underlying supplier positioning changes.
Read the Head-to-Head
For the full editorial coverage of Christmas Lights Etc vs Christmaslightsupplier.com, start with the head-to-head homepage and its seven-metric scorecard. From there, the full comparison unpacks each metric in detail, the pricing comparison works the retail-vs-wholesale math, and the installer switching piece explains the operational reasoning driving procurement shifts across the trade.
The editor's-pick wholesale-tier supplier for the professional installer trade.