In Part One of this series “How To Expand Beyond Your Typical Four-Fixture Routine” Central’s Director of Lighting, Glen Nyhuis gave solutions for getting ahead in the lighting industry and detailed some tips on how you can expand your offerings to include second story and niche lighting. Read below as Glen dives deeper into the next level of fixtures and examines the question: “Are You Filling Your Canvas?”
From Glen:
Happy New Year! To kick the year off, it is a good time to continue our discussion on expanding your lighting knowledge with a few easy steps. In many trainings I do, I take away the realization that many of you are missing some areas in your design plans that could really bring that additional wow factor to your projects.
As lighting contractors, we should be considering ourselves as artists and your job sites as the empty canvas. You would not be a successful artist if you only painted half of a picture, or only filled half of the canvas with paint.
The area we are going to focus on in this Part Two of the series, is the upper level of a home or building. Lighting the façade of a house or municipal building with “framing” or “washing” techniques is not complete unless you take it a step further and show the customers how you can completely fill the canvas for them!
Dormers, eves, areas over porches, columns, balconies, and more are where ground lighting is not sufficient to fully reach. Many of us seem to give up and either not bid on these additional concepts for customers or avoid the conversation all together. Simply this could be because you aren’t comfortable on a ladder, trained properly to wire so many different lights to a system, or you are still developing the confidence to walk a customer through the many new technologies available such as zoning and Wifi/Bluetooth color changing products to incorporate the upper levels.
As we have mentioned in previous articles, remember there is a niche light for every situation. And this includes all those upper-level nooks and crannies! Lighting the second and even third stories of a building is a must-do if you want to fill your canvas and complete your portrait. Make sure to pick the correct fixture for the location. If you have questions about how to pick the right fixture, we are here at Central to help.
Here are some simple tips and tricks to help you get comfortable getting out of your 4 fixture slump and into the upper levels:
- Use gutters, air vents, flashing, and soffets to hid wires
- Attach fixtures to the home using the right technique for the material (stucco, shingles, brick, masonary, etc)
- Attaching fixtures directly to gutters can help avoid customer hesitation with permanently attaching fixture
- Beams of light should never point directly into windows
- Wattage is important on second levels because smaller areas only require minimal wattage, as compared to grander areas down below
- Fixture selection is very important
Being skilled and confident to light the second and third stories of a home or building helps separate you from the competition. This adds value to the property you are working on, as well as adding value in how your customers see you as a professional lighting installer. The good news is Central offer subject matter experts and training to give you the knowledge and confidence to tackle these steps. If you have large projects that need help our Lighting Director and Commercial Services team can work with you to develop a plan.
Another great way to become more skilled in designing and selling lighting on upper levels to home owners, is to utilize efficient and easy-to-use online programs to create digital presentations to display to a customer the powerful impact of illuminating the full canvas. One great program for this is the FX MYDESIGN Program at https://www.fxl.com/my-design. Leverage this free tool to simplify the lighting design process, impress your customers, and close sales faster.
Finally
The team at Central is here to help you break that four-fixture rut while getting up to the second level of design and business in the lighting industry. Let us help you stand out from your competition and win this race. Rely on us to help you grow your business and profits. We can help train your team on the basics, teach new installation and design techniques, help you expand your product arsenal, win more jobs, and design service contracts for an annual/repeat income stream. Reach out to your local Central rep to get started or learn more!
About Glen
Glen Nyhuis has more than three decades in the landscape lighting business. He has worked both in the field installing and design landscape lighting, as well as on the distribution side. Beyond that, he has spent many years teaching and working with contractors on how to sell lighting to their customers. Whether it is a technical or design question, or helping source the right product for a special job, Glen is ready to help you make money and grow your business.