During the holiday season, energy costs are through the roof. Between your family visiting, heat blasting, extravagant meals, indoor and outdoor holiday decorations, and – let’s not forget – your Christmas tree, your electricity doesn’t catch a break. Your Christmas tree is the focal point of your house during the holidays. For many families, there is no debate about the size of their Christmas tree. The bigger, the better!
So how much energy does this gigantic Christmas tree of yours actually use? Well, a large Christmas tree uses around 250 Watts per hour and the average household has their Christmas tree lights on around four hours a day. Like many electronic devices, it still uses energy even when the lights are off.
But don’t let the thought of electricity costs make you a Scrooge this Christmas season. Instead, rely on the newest member of the Staples Connect platform to help you reduce energy costs without losing your Holiday spirit. The CentraLite 3-Series Lamp Module gives the gift of enhanced behavior to your existing home lights and small electronic devices. Many electronic devices still use energy, even when they’re off. With the Lamp Module, you can control the devices plugged into it remotely and shut them off to conserve electricity. Automating your Christmas tree this holiday season can save you energy and money.
Using the CentraLite Lamp Module with Staples Connect, you can schedule it to turn off and on and can get a push notification to your phone so you know the status. You can even pair it with a motion sensor so the lights and devices turn off when the room isn’t in use.
Never worry about accidentally leaving your lights on and unnecessarily running up your electricity bill with the CentraLite Lamp Module and your Staples Connect system. Now you can remove the burden of physically turning the lights on and off every time you leave the room. You can even automate your Christmas tree just in time for this holiday season, giving an classic Christmas tradition a new suite of features.
Today, we’re going to create an Activity that automates your Christmas tree lights using the CentraLite Lamp Module and a motion sensor.
To create this Activity:
- Tap Activities.۬
- Tap New Activity, then enter a name for your Activity.۬
- Choose “I want one of my devices to start the Activity,” then choose the motion sensor in the Living Room.۬
- Next, we need to choose how the Activity starts In this case, choose “The device detects motion.”۬
- Choose when we want this Activity to run. We want this activity to run “Between two times”, 4:00pm and 10:30pm, every day of the week.۬
- Choose the devices we want our Activity to control, which is our CentraLite Lamp Module.۬
- Now we’ll define our activity settings. We want it at full brightness, so we’ll set it to 100.۬
- If you want to be notified when your activity runs, type a message and choose which Users should receive the message. Otherwise, click Skip.۬
- Review your Activity, then click Finish.
Keep energy efficiency in mind as you prepare for the upcoming winter season. Focus on counting your blessings rather than the hidden costs of decorating your home. With Staples Connect and the CentraLite 3-Series Lamp Module, you can finally take control of your home’s energy costs, just in time for the holiday season.