Energy costs needn’t stop a great festive lighting display

Many people are worried about rising energy costs. Perhaps this anxiety extends to town centres, BIDs and other shopping destinations thinking about installing a lighting display as part of an experience upgrade to boost footfall.

The business case comes down to a question of balancing extra visitor numbers and sales against the cost of buying or hiring a display and then running it.

What you’ll never know until after the event is the cost of doing nothing. What if physical retail activity declines further or shoppers are attracted to other destinations that have decided to invest in their experience?

Instead of making assumptions about running costs it’s best to look at the data. The first point to acknowledge is that modern LED lighting displays are so much more energy efficient than in the past.

How energy efficient are LEDs?

LED lights convert 80-90% of the input energy into light; incandescent lights only convert 10-20% of the energy into light. Put another way, almost all the energy used to power your LED lighting display goes to produce a stunning visual experience, rather than to heat filaments that indirectly produce light.

If your display contains 10,000 individual modern LED lights it will typically need less than 800W to power it, compared to over 5,700W needed for incandescent displays to produce a similar lighting intensity. The lower energy consumption also simplifies the electrical installation.

LEDs last longer

LEDs also last. So you get more from your investment. Modern LEDs have a working life of over 50,000 hours and are far less prone to failure than incandescent bulbs. Maintenance costs are much lower than you might have experienced in the past.

The Festive Lighting Company can help you prepare accurate budget estimates for acquiring, maintaining and running your display. So you can model the ROI and prepare a sound business case. We can also help you spread the cost of your initial investment over several years.

If you’re considering a lighting display and would like some technical input into the business case, contact The Festive Lighting Company on 01823 667788 or create@festivelighting.co.uk.