How to Start a Christmas Light Installation Business in 2026

To start a Christmas light installation business this season, buy commercial C9 LED line and clips for your first few houses (about $2 a foot), a ladder tall enough for the homes on your street and general liability insurance, then sell rooflines to neighbours before Thanksgiving. Installed lighting sells for $5 to $12 a foot, and January takedown is a second paid visit.

The window is short. Installs run from early November into December, takedowns run through January, and the same lights go back up next year on the same houses. Everything below is dated for the 2026 season: what the kit costs, what to charge, how to find the first ten customers by walking your own neighbourhood, and how to stay off the emergency room's list.

To price a specific house tonight, use the Christmas light installation price calculator. It takes linear feet, storeys, whose lights go up and your takedown charge, and shows what the job leaves you per hour.

How much does it cost to start a Christmas light business?

About $1,600 gets you lights for four 100-foot rooflines, a two-storey ladder and a month of insurance. Most of that is bulbs, and you reuse them for several seasons.

The cord and bulbs are what professional installers use: an empty-socket line you cut to the exact length of each roofline, with retrofit LED bulbs pushed into the sockets. Christmas Designers calls LED retrofit bulbs the main C7 and C9 bulb used by professional installers, and says they are brighter and last longer than a strand with the bulbs pre-attached. Plugs are sold separately, so add a male and a female slide-on plug for each run.

If your street is mostly single-storey, a shorter ladder you already own may do for this season. Buy the 28-foot ladder when you book your first two-storey house, not before.

Leave a vehicle off the list if you already have one that fits a ladder rack. A 1,000-foot spool of line ships at about 40 pounds, and four houses of lights fit in labelled plastic bins.

How much can you charge for Christmas light installation?

HomeGuide's cost guide puts professional installation at $5 to $12 per linear foot, or $250 to $1,500 for a basic roofline and $750 to $5,000 for a full package of rooflines, windows, garage and landscaping. Its ranges by storey run from $250 to $2,400 for one storey to $750 to $5,000 for three. Removal on its own runs $100 to $400 when it is not already included.

Angi's 2026 figures are lower because they include customers' own lights. From 2,242 projects its pros reported, the national average is $444, and most homeowners pay $220 to $684. Angi lists labour at $2 to $5 a linear foot, $60 to $100 an hour, or a minimum of $150 to $300 a job.

Here is one job worked through, using the calculator's defaults. A single-storey roofline of 100 feet at $7 a foot is $700. Takedown and storage add $150, so the customer pays $850 for the season. Your lights for that house cost $206, but you reuse them for three seasons, so this year carries about $69 of it. That leaves about $781 for six crew hours, or roughly $130 an hour before insurance and tax.

Price the second storey higher. The ladder is longer, the work is slower and the fall is further. The calculator adds 25% for two storeys and 50% for three by default; those percentages are our assumption, so change them once you know your local market.

Should you use your own lights or the customer's?

Use your own on every house you can. HomeGuide notes that some companies install customers' lights at a lower price, while others only install and rent out their own lights because it makes installing and storing them easier. Your own line is cut to that house, tested in your garage, and comes down in January into a bin with the customer's name on it.

The customer's lights are cheaper for them and slower for you. You will meet tangled strands, dead sections and plugs that do not reach the outlet, and every fault is billed at Angi's $2 to $5 a foot rather than HomeGuide's $5 to $12. If you take these jobs, charge by the hour or set a minimum, and say before you start that you replace dead strands at the customer's cost.

Your own lights also make next year easier. The line is already cut and labelled, so a returning customer's install is faster than the first one, at the same price.

How do you get your first 10 customers before Thanksgiving?

Walk your own neighbourhood. Christmas lights are sold to people who can see the house, so the cheapest advertising is a lit house and a person at the door.

1. Light your own house first. Do it this week. It is your demo, your photo and your practice run, and you will learn how long 100 feet takes you.
2. Knock on doors on streets with gutters and no lights. Bring a photo on your phone, a price from your calculator and a booking date. Set yourself a number, such as 30 doors in an evening, and keep a list of who said maybe.
3. Post once in your neighbourhood groups. Nextdoor and local Facebook groups reach the people within walking distance of your demo house. Use one photo, a starting price and the dates you have left.
4. Ask for a yard sign. A small sign in the garden of every lit house says who did it. Offer a little off takedown in return, and put your phone number on the sign in large type.
5. Text the customers you already have. If you mow, wash windows or pressure wash, your existing customers already trust you on a ladder. Send a photo and a price.
6. Ask for one referral at every install. The neighbours will be standing in the street watching you work. Have a card ready.

You do not need a website to book ten houses. You need a phone number, a photo, a price per foot and a calendar with real dates on it.

Is hanging Christmas lights dangerous?

Yes, and the danger is the ladder. CDC's National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health counted 161 workplace deaths and 22,710 workplace injuries from ladders in 2020. It says about 40% of ladder injuries start with an extension ladder sliding out at the base because it was set at the wrong angle, and recommends about 75 degrees. OSHA says that falls from ladders make up nearly a third of fall deaths in construction each year.

Run every job with these rules:

• Work in pairs on anything above one storey, with one person footing the ladder.
• No roof work in rain, ice, frost or wind. Reschedule.
• Use a ladder rated for your weight plus your tools, and set it at about 75 degrees.
• Clip the lights to the gutter or shingles. Do not nail, screw or staple into the house.

Keep the electrical work to plugging into outdoor outlets that already exist. Christmas Designers rates one run of its 18-gauge line for 250 C9 LED bulbs or 250 feet, whichever comes first, so a large house needs more than one run and more than one outlet. If an outlet keeps tripping, has no GFCI protection, or the customer wants a new outdoor outlet, tell them it needs a licensed electrician.

Do you need insurance for a Christmas light business?

Get general liability before your first paid house. It pays for damage you cause to the customer's property, such as a cracked gutter, a dented car or a ladder through a window. Insureon reports its small-business customers pay a median of $45 a month, with annual premiums from $265 to $3,030 depending on the work and the limits.

Tell the insurer you work on ladders and roofs, because it changes the policy. HomeGuide tells homeowners to ask installers about liability insurance before they sign, so expect the question and keep a certificate on your phone.

If a friend helps you for pay, ask the insurer about workers' compensation. Most states require it once you have employees.

What does the takedown pay?

It is a second paid visit to every house you lit. HomeGuide says most professionals recommend taking lights down by mid-January and that many installers return two to four weeks after New Year's Day. It prices removal at $100 to $400 when it is not included in the install price.

Book the takedown date at the install, in writing. Pack each house's line into its own labelled bin, test it in January while you still remember which section flickered, and store it dry. That bin is next November's install.

Add a storage line to the quote if you keep the customer's own lights. A bin on your shelf for ten months is a service.

Should you buy a Christmas lighting franchise instead?

Only after you have read the disclosure document. Franchises such as Christmas Decor and Brite Nites sell a brand, training and wholesale supply. Third-party sites publish franchise fees for them that disagree with each other by tens of thousands of dollars, so we have not printed any.

The FTC's Franchise Rule requires a franchisor to give you its current disclosure document at least 14 calendar days before you sign or pay. Items 5 and 7 of that document set out the initial fee and the total investment. Compare them with the $1,600 kit above and decide what the brand is worth to you.

Your plan: November 2 to December 13, 2026

Who should skip this?

• People afraid of heights or working alone. Two-storey work needs a second person, every time.
• People with no weekends free until mid-December. Installs are daylight work, and the evenings are dark early.
• People with no dry storage. Four houses of lights fit in a garage corner. Forty houses do not fit in a flat.
• People in apartment-heavy neighbourhoods. Rooflines you can sell are on detached houses with gutters.

What do you sell to these customers after January?

The same people pay for window cleaning in spring, gutter cleaning in autumn and pressure washing in summer, and you already own the ladder. Our window cleaning business guide and pressure washing business guide cover those routes. If you live where it snows, the same street needs its driveways cleared from December: see how to start a snow removal business.