Holiday Glow Is Less Radiant at Some Firms : * Costs: To help contain expenses, companies have reduced Christmas tree and lighting displays. Unocal did--then changed its mind.

Unocal’s landmark Christmas tree of lights--a 117-foot-tall exhibition of 2,600 twinkling orange-and-white, 40-watt bulbs--was nearly a victim of the little recovery that couldn’t.

Every year since 1968, the lights have come on atop the 13-story headquarters building on Thanksgiving night, except for 1973--when the tree was sacrificed because of the Arab oil embargo. This year, the company decided that the tree would go dark because of corporate cost cutting.

After negative public reaction, however, Unocal executives decreed Wednesday that there would be light after all.

“We got a few calls,” spokesman Barry Lane said. As a result, “the Christmas tree is going up.” It will be lit tonight and shine each night through Jan. 1 at a cost of “several thousand dollars.”

Unocal’s flip-flop underscores corporate turmoil across the nation that is translating in some cases into fewer visible signs of holiday cheer.

Professional decorators report that some corporate clients have turned Scrooge-like with their budgets, are waiting longer to put up decorations or are simply ignoring the holidays altogether.

“That’s the word around the industry,” said Jonathan Alburger, manager of Holly Workshop, a Santa Barbara-based company that for 31 years has manufactured Christmas decorations and designed displays for companies, cities and shopping centers. “Some (people) definitely are hurting.”

Alburger said Holly Workshop is enjoying “a very good Christmas,” which he credited to aggressive salesmanship and the company’s lengthy track record.

“Earlier this year, we were sweating, but it turned out rather nice,” he said. “Some clients canceled, but we got other new ones.”

Becker Group, the nation’s largest decorator of retail outlets, has “maintained volume,” according to Joseph Babinski, chief operating officer of the Baltimore firm. “It’s not the major increase that we’re used to seeing.

“In many cases, people delayed doing Christmas this year. In many cases, they set a restrictive budget,” he said, adding that between 450 and 500 malls nationwide display Becker Group’s elaborate designs.

“We did a few less Christmases this year than we did last year, but we still had a very good volume, and we found people who needed a new Christmas this year,” either for a new mall or to replace fading decorations, he said.

Two of the four trees lit each holiday season on local Glendale Federal Bank branches have fallen to cost cutting.

The thrift, which has been drastically reducing expenses this year, lit a tree at its Glendale headquarters and at its Sherman Oaks branch next to the Ventura Freeway, spokeswoman Judy Cunningham said.

But trees in Beverly Hills and Woodland Hills didn’t go up this year so the company could donate money to agencies benefiting the homeless, she said. Two of four trees at its Florida branches also are dark, she said.