Commercial (shop) lighting - recommendations?

HI Folks A group of us are setting up a co-operative art & crafts gallery / shop out here in south-west Ireland.

We've pretty much decided on some premises - but they're going to need some work to improve the lighting. Decent lighting's pretty important to show off the items that are on sale. However, we're on a fairly tight budget - not just for the capital items (light fittings etc) but also for the ongoing running costs.

Premises currently have 2 double fluorescents (5ft or so?) in the larger room (24ft x 10ft) and one double flouro in the smaller room (13ft x

8ft). There are also two recessed downlighters fitted with led spots - but they don;t seem to contribute much light (if any!!)

Spotlights would be great, but we're concerned about installation & running costs - and I've used led spots in the past to replace the little 50w halogen spots on an exhibition stand and they are simply not bright enough.

So - not wanting to start a 'holy war' on leds vs halogen - but what's peoples experience on lighting such a retail outlet....

..my gut feel is more fluoro's - not pretty, but highly effective and cheap to run...??

Thanks Adrian

Reply to
Adrian Brentnall
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In which case, you really ought to be looking very seriously at whether you have made the right decision. Under capitalisation is one of the most common causes of business failure.

Display lighting is a science (or maybe an art) all of its own and there will be no simple one size fits all answer. Centralised fluorescent lighting would be fine for a grocery store, but an art gallery needs to focus attention on individual products, which means you will need some focus lighting. Unless, of course, you simply plan to heap lots of stuff inside and hope that people will find something they want. They probably won't bother to look though.

If you are in a suitable location for an open shop front (one with a window) then you might, at the beginning, get away with just using spots in that. As you don't want the window too cluttered, that could mean as few as two or three spots illuminating as many objects. There should also be some light near the bottom of the window, to avoid pooling of shadows, but that could simply be a strip light, provided it is shaded from view from outside. In the longer term, you should add focus lighting (which should be 2-2.5 times as bright as the background lighting) to displays inside as you can afford them. Ideally, they should be movable, so you can redirect the focus from time to time, which gives people a feel that the shop has changed since they last visited.

If you are in a low-traffic location (why?) a closed shop front may be more effective, but then you will need to make an impact with the display as people step through the door, which would mean you need to give more attention to focus lighting inside.

The best answer is to go out and look at other shops, particularly any in the same line, even if it means a fair bit of travel to do so, and see what works.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
Nightjar

Fluorescent is cheap, hence its been so popular for so long. With the old linear tubes, the longer the tube the more efficient, both energywise and moneywise. So whatever you do, at least a percentage of flourescent helps keep costs down. Spotlighting is pricey to run on a per result basis.

NT

Reply to
NT

Thanks.

Touch of negativity going on here..?

We _do_ understand the need to have attractive, bright, uncluttered displays - which is why I'm asking about lighting....

Yes - good ideas - thanks We do have a nice open shopfront (windows & door are the full width & height of the shop) so need to balance and attractive display with the ability to 'see though' the display into the gallery proper.

We aren't...

Yes, thanks - already doing that....

Adrian

Reply to
Adrian Brentnall

Yes - thanks. Sounds like a mix of spot & fluoro is the way to go. My folks ran a gifts / jewellery / clocks & watches shop back in the

80's - and I remember Dad saying that, some days in the winter, the spotlights cost more than the shop took... so we want to avoid that scenario if at all possible...

Found a document from Sustainable Energy Ireland

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more or less discounts led lighting other than close-up for localised lighting (which was my experience with the display stand).

I had very good results at shows with a couple of 150w halogen 'mini-floods' - but they look a bit agricultural for 'gallery' use. Also

- at the shows, 'somebody else' was paying for the electricity!

Thanks Adrian

Reply to
Adrian Brentnall

Yes. Aim on lighting up the goods well. Look at using perimeter wall washers, which can be very effective for goods around the walls, zero glare. A light coloured decoration scheme would mean reflected light will probably be enough for general lighting in isles without needing much additional, except perhaps some task lighting for areas like the till and to catch customers' faces well if using CCTV.

Could retain the existing lights as cleaner's lighting, if you don't need them for the shop's operation and they're not too unsightly.

Reply to
Andrew Gabriel

An Indian restaurant near us was refitted a few years ago with mains halogen lamps, probably about 100 ceiling inserts in all each placed about 75cms apart. Pretty bright clinical lighting.

Though, when we went in there recently, every second bulb had been removed. And the remaining replaced with a supermarket CFL hanging off a cable attached to a bodged-in chocolate block connector. I'm sure that wasn't in the original quote for the garish makeover!

Food still great. All ye can eat buffet for £7.95. How do thay do that!

(Answer: it's now a bit dark....)

Reply to
Adrian C

:

If you're lighting glassware, you can sit the glass directly on a very low power light source, eg a small CFL in a box with a hole in the top. Cover the box with cloth. Very cost efficient, and good at making the pieces stand out.

I dont know whether you can get away with just one spotlight per item. The nearer the spots are to the product, the lower power they can be, so there is often mileage in having 5 watt spots right up almost touching the item.

NT

Reply to
NT

...

Merely an observation on many arts and craft places, of which we have quite a few in the area.

A lot of retailers don't seem to understand the principles of displaying goods.

As an additional thought, you can get low energy downlighters, which, while not as good as steerable spots, could give you areas of higher light levels where you can place displays, without being too expensive to run.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
Nightjar

Shop keepers have any amount of enthusiasm at refit/opening time, after the doors are open even a spare lamp seems too much expense.

It is good that your thinking about ongoing costs, including maintenance.

Lighting level is almost relative to value of stock, in a supermarket very high illuminance levels and lots of stock, giving the feeling of plenty on a bright day.

In a boutique, levels will be lower, the sparsely presented stock will be highlighted and circulation areas are dimmer than the offering. A feeling of exclusivity and rarity.

One rule for both ends though, the area around the till, where money changes hands, must be noticeably brighter than the surround, you`ll notice it even in supermarkets.

Lighting is an energy intensive activity, Source One, the Sun is not a low energy lamp, any attempt we can make to replicate its effect uses energy in quantity.

Low voltage Halogen is still a good choice for spotlighting, LED is close to the 35W halogen level now, but at 20 quid plus a lamp, its a long payback period.

CMH/CDM ceramic metal halide is also a good spotlighting choice for very high intensity, expensive intially but running and maintenance costs are low, lamp life 12K hrs + efficiency 33%+ better than halogen.

Metal halide in the 75/150W flavours can give you a big wadge of light to create presence in a window, high street clothes shops , or high intensity sparkle , high street jewellers.

LED is available for high intensity long throw applications and may make sense if your opening hours are long or natural light is non- existent, takes these conditions to make payback realistic.

LED for close up lighting is a no brainer, it can be installed into shelf undersides and incorporated within fittings to create displays that glow with no visible source.LED tape in the best quality white you can afford and a router....

Built some shelves for a project using twin wall polycarb roofing sheet and run 10mm wide LED tape down the very front flute, it lights the object on the shelf and creates an infinty mirror look below it, cheap and effective trick.

Highly effective at just lighting the space not at creating a retail enviroment conducive to shifting stock.

Fluro for the cleaners lights as already suggested ;-)

One other thing to bear in mind when choosing sources, Colour Rendering Index, CRI, closer to 100 , daylight, more accurate colours will appear. Only source that does have a CRI of 100 apart from the Sun is halogen, all other sources will distort colours slightly in one way or another, fluro tends to have too much green, LED is very lacking in red, this may be important with some of your displayed pieces.

Cheers Adam

Reply to
Adam Aglionby

Indeed, and probably the "backbone" of the general illumination in the shop. The "non glare" fittings often used in offices with lots of computer screens can look somewhat more attractive than the traditional ceiling mounted batten holders.

For sparkly displays, small bright sources will get the best results. If you use halogen spots, then low voltage are much better than mains (in terms of quality of light, lamp life, and efficiency), especially with the dichroic lamps which throw less heat forward, and add colourful splashes of light from the side/rear.

Metal halides are popular in shops due to a good combination of lower running costs, bright lights with good specular reflection characteristics (makes shiny things sparkle!)

Wall washers create more atmosphere than blanket central lighting.

Reply to
John Rumm

No aisles to worry about - the place is fairly small. I had thought about the 'floodlight' approach. Ceilings are reasonably high, so should be possible to get a reasonable angle on the floods so as to avoid people standing in their own shadow.

No plans for CCTV .... yet!

Might be a plan. The current fluoro tubes are grubby and of unknown vintage - so maybe we'll clean / replace them first and see what that does.

Thanks

Reply to
Adrian Brentnall

Yes - good idea. Most of my glass (stained / fused) are panels and are best displayed with light behind them (that'll be a challenge!)

Yes - one of the craftspeople is an excellent silver/gold-smith - in his own shop he has some small display cabinets with tiny spot built in, very close to the items on display. Looks effective.

Reply to
Adrian Brentnall

Fairy nuff! We have a very good idea of how we _don't_ want it to look

- try to get away from the 'craft market' look and more 'studio/gallery' It's going to be an interesting time!

Agreed. And it's one of those things like background music in films - if done properly it's not 'obvious', but it has the desired effect.

Ah - good idea. The SEI document that I referenced elsewhere has a very interesting comparison section, which makes it very clear why LED spotlights have some way to go

You're right about the shop window - we need to work on making that as enticing as possible...

Fun, fun, fun!

Thanks Adrian

Reply to
Adrian Brentnall

Reading the answers it looks like this lot could make a useful wiki article. I suppose it would be for diy shopfitting, but not house maintenance.

NT

Reply to
NT

HI Yes - it did seem quite straightforward and 'fluff-free'.... I'm sure they'd be happy to let you reproduce it if you asked them - and, if you didn't, then they'd probably never know!

A
Reply to
Adrian Brentnall

On 07/02/2012 14:16, Adrian Brentnall wrote: ...

A thick piece of perspex sheet (c10mm), tapered from bottom to top, with the back polished and the front roughened, mounted on a box that contains a light* that shines into the edge of the sheet. That will produce a fairly evenly lit sheet that also acts as a display stand.

  • I used to use strip lights sold for under kitchen cupboards, but a row of LEDs would probably do as well these days, as well as producing less heat for less power.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
Nightjar

"Most of my glass (stained / fused) are panels and are best displayed with light behind them (that'll be a challenge!) >

You could also add to gain maximum use of window space at night some low power spots highlighting certain areas of the shop but on a sort of timer so it changes throughout the night. I saw this done in a hairdressers and was impressive. With it being totally dark even low wattage should create an effect. It gets attention throughout the night as people walk past.

Reply to
ss

On 07/02/2012 14:22, Adrian Brentnall wrote: ...

I think it was in Muenster that I saw a shop that sold blown glass art. It had a flat screen display in the window, showing a video of how some of the items were made. Movement is always eye catching and it was also very interesting to watch.

Colin Bignell

Reply to
Nightjar

Pre owned goods?

Reply to
dennis

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