At a recent retailer seminar at the Chicago Gift Show, interior and commercial designer Mick Santiago encouraged attendees to go back to their stores and check for burned out display lighting. And sure enough, he was right — our store had several bulbs that needed replacing.

Santiago is the Chicago Merchandise Mart’s resident interior designer, and as part of his job he creates lots of vignettes in the lobby and on the show floors.  He is passionate about the role that color and accent lighting play in merchandise displays.

Although I don’t thing that Santiago was involved in this showcase display for Odegard on the main floor of the Merchandise Mart, it shows the importance of accent light in bringing a display alive.  In this case the light not only focuses the eye on the featured product, but it also makes it sparkle.  Good lighting is essential for window displays and showcases like this one, but it is also important on the sales floor.

Your choice of lighting impacts the color that customers see when they look at the merchandise in your store, and bulbs are rated on the CRI (color rendering index). In general the more natural the light, the better.  Natural light also contributes to the shopper’s comfort level when browsing in your shop.

In addition to your store’s ambient, or background, lighting, you need to consider how best to select accent lights that highlight what you are selling. You are in essence adding a layer of light to the store’s ambient lighting.  Keep in mind that the brightness of the background light will impact the effectiveness this additional layer. It’s hard to compete with fluorescent ambient lighting.

There are two key components at play in the accent lighting that you choose:  the range of the light, and the color or quality it projects.

A spotlight, for example, has a wide range, and may be more cost-effective than using many smaller bulbs.  There are now CFL (compact fluorescent) spotlights that are quite energy efficient. 

But a narrow-focus, point source bulb is most effective for drawing the eye to a specific piece of merchandise — as in the illustration. These bulbs are usually incandescent,  halogen or LED. Halogens and LEDs usually offer a more specific type of light than incandescents.

According to Furniture World magazine, “If color is the first requirement of retail lighting, then pop, sparkle and texture are next on the list.” LED point source lighting offers a sharp light with these characteristics, and are an alternative to the  halogen bulbs often used for focused, sparkling light. They are more expensive than halogen bulbs, however they last considerably longer and use less power. For more information, see this helpful article by Jerry Song.

No matter what your choices are, your lighting is only effective if you keep the fixtures focused (even when you move a display) and the bulbs changed.  So take a moment to walk through your store, and let there be light!

Happy Retailing,

Carol “Orange” Schroeder