Installing LED lighting systems will offer electrical contractors new opportunities to increase profits, but to succeed in the new world of lighting they will have to keep up with this quickly evolving technology and work closely with building owners and other buying influences to learn what they want in new lighting systems. On Day One of the 2016 NECA Annual Meeting, Dan Blitzer, a 30-year lighting industry veteran and founder of Practical Lighting Workshop, New York, and Jon Zelinsky, director, Contractor Marketing, Philips Lighting, gave electrical contractors a two-hour overview of the LED market that included tips on building a business in LED retrofits and alerted them about some of the limitations of the latest LED technology.
Blitzer said one issue with LED lighting that will impact NECA contractors is the fact that because of lumen depreciation, LEDs dim over time and sometimes one LED fixture will dim at a different rate than another in an installation. Electrical contractors will typically get the call about this issue, and they will have to know how to educate customers about the issue and suggest a remedy, which might be replacing the fixtures in question and adjusting the LED drivers to produce light at the same brightness and color as the rest of the lighting fixtures, or suggesting a complete retrofit. He said electrical contractors should ask building owners what kind of expectations they have for their lighting system, how long they are staying in the space and who maintains it.
Blitzer and Zelinsky also offered insight into connected lighting systems where new IoT-enabled lighting controls help fixtures collect and harvest usage data from individual lighting fixtures and blend that data with information collected from other building systems, including HVAC and security, to customize workplace environmental solutions for building owners and occupants.