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Lighting for Showroom: A Commercial Lighting Guide for India
LIGHTING FOR SHOWROOM
Vetted by
SocialBeat , Senior Architect, Delhi
September 12, 2022
To say that lighting for any showroom or store is important would be an understatement. If you ask any visual merchandiser, they'll tell you that the most important element of a well-thought-out store plan is fantastic lighting. This is because when a customer walks into your store, the first thing that draws them in is the overall ambience and vibe, besides the product itself. So it is crucial to invest in some high-quality lighting and do your products justice with the perfect retail store lighting. But don't be overwhelmed, as this guide is here to help you start from scratch with a breakdown of the best lighting for showroom that will make your store stand out from the crowd!
Before we begin, let's get down to the basics with what retail lighting entails and what purpose it aims to serve.
1 | Chapter
What is Retail Store Lighting?
Retail lighting falls under the commercial lighting tree and it includes all lighting, both natural and artificial sources that illuminate your space while strategically highlighting products or areas of your store. The purpose of good interior retail lighting is to draw customers in, provide them with enough vision to see your products clearly while also setting the right mood to impress them and make a purchase. Choosing the right store lighting involves strategic thinking and careful planning, in order to achieve your purpose.
In this article, we will begin by understanding the 4 main types of lighting and how they can be used together to make for an attractive commercial lighting solution. After learning about the basics of commerical lighting, we will understand how to set the right vibe with different lighting fixtures and create a custom store lighting plan that's perfect just for you. Finally, we will end with 5 showroom lighting ideas that can inspire you before you embark on your journey to create the ultimate showroom for your brand.
2 | Chapter
4 Main Types of Lighting for Showroom
Before choosing the right lighting design for shop, we first need to understand the basics of lighting in terms of interior design so we can blend them together for a perfect melange for your store. Let's begin with the 4 major types of lighting:
1. Ambient Lighting
Also known as general lighting, the purpose of this type is to illuminate the entire space and is used as a primary lighting source for any space. In the showroom sense, this is the type of lighting that allows customers to walk around safely while browsing through your assortment of products. All strategic lighting showroom display ideas begin with ambient lighting as their base layer to which you can add on task, accent and decorative lighting.
2. Task Lighting
The purpose of task lighting is to focus light on a particular area to emphasise its importance while allowing functionality to that specific zone to perform tasks. When we look at task lighting in a retail setting, you would use this type of lighting in areas you want to draw focus to, like the cash register for billing, or the fitting rooms if you are looking for clothing store lighting ideas.
3. Accent Lighting
The purpose of this type of lighting is to accentuate specific products, displays or areas of the room in a subtle manner. While accent lighting isn't commonly used in office lighting design, it has a strong role to play in lighting for showrooms as they help make products more attractive to potential customers. Choosing accent lighting for your showroom can be difficult as you need to begin with identifying what items within your merchandise you want to highlight and how you want to accentuate them.
4. Decorative Lighting
Lastly, we have decorative lighting with the purpose of improving the aesthetic of your space and ensuring cohesiveness within your entire store. As the name suggests, decorative lighting fulfils an aesthetic purpose rather than a utilitarian one and usually takes up a sizable chunk of your retail lighting budget. Large decorative lighting displays help draw the attention of passersby and set the tone of your entire store. For eg., the showroom light design of a jewellery store can include grand chandeliers and statement pendant lights to set the tone of the store as a luxurious place.
Now that you understand the fundamentals of commercial lighting design, it's time to ask yourself some crucial questions.
Steps to Planning Commercial Lighting for Showroom
Now that you understand the fundamentals of commercial lighting design, it's time to ask yourself some crucial questions.
1. How big is my retail space?
This will determine how much lighting you need to illuminate the entire space. You will require more lighting fixtures that are bigger in size and height.
2. What mood do you want to set?
The mood of your store speaks volumes about your brand and creates the first impression when a potential customer walks in.
3. What is the budget for my showroom lighting design?
At the end of the day, it all comes down to how much you can spend. But this doesn't mean that you have to compromise on the aesthetics if money is tight. If you are working around a very tight budget, your focus should be on finding durable, ambient lights to first fully illuminate the space and then spend the rest of your money on accent lights to highlight products/ areas. If budget isn't a huge concern, you can invest in statement lights that represent the vibes of your store or you can even hire a visual merchandiser to get professional lighting assistance.
Once you have the answers to these key questions, it's time to pick out your lighting fixtures. Let's discuss 10 common commercial lighting fixtures, along with their purpose and application, so you can decide what could potentially work for you.
3 | Chapter
10 Types of Lighting Ideas for Showrooms
While there are hundreds of different lighting fixtures for you to choose from while selecting your store's showroom light design, we have broken them down into 10 main types, based on their fitting, application and purpose.
1. Downlights
Probably the most common type of retail lights, downlights are also called recessed lights as they are installed into the recesses of the ceiling and cast a concentrated light downwards. These lights can provide both, ambient as well as task lighting, depending on the brightness and work excellently on low ceilings. They also distribute light uniformly with minimal shadows and are affordable to buy and install, making them an excellent choice for your retail store lighting.
2. LED Panel Lights
Panel lights cast a wider beam of light, providing the room with ample ambient light without any shadows. These lights are extremely comfortable to look at and are perfect in rooms with high ceilings. Because of their simplistic designs, they work excellently with a minimal aesthetic or for electronics' showroom light design as the lights don't draw too much attention to themselves.
3. Track Lights
Track lights for showrooms are some of the best options for retail purposes, regardless of what your store sells as they are completely multidirectional, giving you the flexibility to shine light on whatever and wherever you like. While track lights for showrooms mainly provide accent and task lighting, when placed in multiples across your space, they can also create a vibrant ambient lighting.
Want to know more about track lights? Check out the below video on Jaquar's Magnetic lights- the best retail lighting solution for your store!
4. Spot Lights
While sometimes similar to downlights in appearance, spot lights are fixed directly onto a wall or ceiling and can provide multiple beams of light onto an area or product. Spot lights are used to accentuate a product/ area and hence provide accent or task lighting for showroom. Tiny spotlights can also be installed in shelves to emphasise small products like accessories, cosmetics, gadgets and electronics, etc.
5. LED Strip Lights
LED strip lights are the perfect addition to add more accent lighting to your space as they can subtly highlight architectural features in your store and even highlight products on shelves when placed underneath shelves for a dramatic effect. They are perfect for showroom lighting as they draw attention in a subtle manner.
6. Chandeliers
Chandeliers are an excellent way to bring a sense of grandeur to your store while creating a focus point around your entire store. Chandeliers come in a variety of different styles, so you can find one that matches perfectly with your store vibe and aesthetic. They cast a wide beam of light across a large area and they make excellent showroom lighting ideas if you have high ceilings and a relatively large store area. Choosing the right chandelier can be an overwhelming process but once you get it right, it can change your entire showroom lighting.
7. Pendant Lights
Pendant lights are some of the best lights for showrooms because they produce task, accent and decorative lighting and are ideal for small spaces. Pendant lights come in a plethora of designs, giving you thousands of options to choose from based on your style needs. It is important to note that pendant lights do not require bright light bulbs as they are suspended close to the ground and may hurt the eyes of people in the store.
8. Surface Mounted Lights
If your retail space is too small to opt for a suspended chandelier but you're still looking for a decorative lighting fixture, then surface-mounted lights may be the best choice for you. These types of lights are mounted onto the ceiling, making them low profile and are usually available in a vast variety of designs to choose from.
9. Adjustable Lights
Adjustable lights are an absolute necessity for showrooms because the direction of light can be adjusted in any direction and the light source is precise, providing both, task and accent lighting. Unlike track lighting, the position of the light cannot be changed but the adjustability gives great flexibility in emphasising an area of choice without spending too much money.
10. LED Backlit Posters
LED backlit posters/boards are a great way for retail stores to advertise their products or emphasise an area by placing LED lights behind the board to further amplify and brighten it up. While these are definitely not a primary source of light, they add a great touch to your room. They draw your customer's eyes to the board and are an energy-efficient way to advertise.
4 | Chapter
Choosing the Right Brightness, Tone and Bulb Type
Once you choose your fixtures for your interior retail lighting, it's time to decide the bulb brightness, tone and bulb type. Lighting is always measured in two ways- based on their brightness and their tone and these two factors along with energy efficiency vary for different types of bulbs. Let's discuss these three elements in detail to help you create an effective lighting design for shop.
Brightness
Brightness of your lights is measured in lumens- a measure of the total amount of visible light that's emitted by a light source per unit of time. Watts used to be an indicator of brightness and correlates the efficiency of the bulb to the brightness level. However, this doesn't work as there are several highly efficient bulbs (low watts) like halogen and LED that produce bright light.
The brightness of your bulbs plays an important role in setting the ambiance of your space, and can way depending on the type of retail store. For example, the bulbs of a spa need to be dim and subtle, to set the mood of relaxation from the moment the customer walks in.
Tone
Tone here in terms of lighting refers to the colour temperature of your light bulbs. The tone is measured through kelvin- higher the kelvin, cooler the light is. It also plays a vital role in setting the ambience of your store and the colour temperature can even change the appearance of your product. For example, a pharmacy or hardware store may require cool-toned lights to maximise visibility and make the space appear clean. But when opting for clothing store lighting ideas, you may opt for warmer lights as they are more flattering on customers who are trying on clothing, making them more likely to buy your product.
Bulb Type
Lastly, it's time to choose your bulb type. No one bulb type is best for all types of lighting fixtures but you can achieve any lighting scheme with any type of bulb nowadays. There are 4 main factors to consider while choosing your bulb type- energy efficiency, cost, tone range and type of lighting that the bulb is best suited for. Let's look at the three most common types of bulbs used in lighting for showrooms:
Compact Fluorescent (CFL): These bulbs often mimic incandescent bulbs and can sometimes even fit into incandescent lighting fixtures. They are cost-efficient, last you around 7-10 years and give you around 50-70 lumens per watt. They are available in a full spectrum of colour temperatures and are best for ambient and task lighting.
Halogen Bulbs: These bulbs are a type of incandescent bulbs that utilise halogen gas to increase brightness and operating life. They are probably the most affordable variety but have a short operating life of 1-2 years. They are not the most energy efficient as they only cast between 12-15 lumens per watt. Again, these lights are also available in a full spectrum of colours and they are best for task, accent and decorative lighting but not for ambient lighting.
LED Bulbs: These modern bulbs produce light through light-emitting diodes and are some of the best options for your lighting needs. They tend to cost more than other types of bulbs but they emit 60 lumens per watt, meaning LED lights help save the most energy. The operating life of LED lights varies depending on bulb and brand but could be anywhere between 2 to 8 years. You can find them in a full spectrum of colours and they are suitable for all lighting showroom display ideas.
5 | Chapter
Tips for an Effective Store Lighting Plan
Before we part ways, let's discuss some tips to create an effective lighting for showroom plan. Now that you know about the different fixtures, how to choose the right type of lighting based on your needs and how to choose the right bulbs, it's time to create a store plan that's customised for your space. Here are 5 tips to keep in mind to guide you in the right direction:
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Adopt a balanced approach
Too much of anything is never good. An example of too much is having too many chandeliers and decorative lights in your space. Instead of making your room feel grand, it can do the opposite by making the space tacky and distracting from the product itself. When it comes to choosing your showroom lighting, be mindful to layer lighting in a balanced manner to create a soft and subtle glow for your room.
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Be wary of shadows
Shadows can completely ruin the appearance of your space and when cast on your products/merchandise, they can hide them from the purview of your customers. Hence, while choosing your store lighting, be mindful to include enough ambient light to hide shadows.
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Don't be stingy on ambient lighting
This point correlates to the previous one, where it is crucial to have ample ambient lighting in your space. While it may be tempting to focus your resources on accent lighting to accentuate your merchandise, you need to have enough light for your customers to move around freely and safely with maximum visibility. When you accent everything, you also end up emphasising nothing, in particular, thereby reducing the ability to make your products pop.
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Guide customers with focal points
Did you know that you can actually guide your customers through your store with the help of lighting? Strategic placement of lighting for showrooms can in fact give directional flow to your room. So while creating your lighting plan, highlight some key areas and make them focal points with your lighting to draw customers to those areas.
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Beware of texture and doing too much
Lighting can sometimes emphasise texture, making them reflect harsh beams on shiny, bright objects. Too many dark finishes and dark walls can also oddly reflect ceiling lights and can distract from the purpose of the store.
The End of the Tunnel
We've finally reached the light at the end of the tunnel as we conclude this guide on choosing the best showroom lighting. We hope our guide can help you along the process of creating the best lighting plan to attract customers and leave them awestruck by your retail space. Our final words of advice would be to plan, plan, plan! Choosing your store lighting is a big commitment and should be one that you'll be happy with for a long time. Hence you must strategically plan, weigh out your options and choose quality over quantity!
Buy Your Commercial Lighting with Jaquar Today!
If you are looking for the ultimate one-stop shop for all your lighting for showroom needs, then Jaquar is the place for you! Catering to all types of retail businesses, Jaquar offers premium lighting solutions in a plethora of styles to choose from and are guaranteed to last you a long time. Finally, Jaquar also brings its excellence and expertise to the field of lighting with impeccable customer service that caters to all your questions and lighting requirements. If you are ready to begin your retail lighting journey, contact Jaquar today!
Learn more about Jaquar's retail lighting options today!
Frequently Asked Questions
Most retail stores nowadays utilise LED lighting across their stores and swear by them as they are the most energy-efficient and durable options in the market.
The number of lumens required for your retail store depends on many factors like the size of the store and how bright you want your space to be. You can find several calculators online to help you along the process of finding the right no. of lumens required for your store.
While lighting for a restaurant more or less follows the same as lighting for showrooms but the amount of lighting required would depend on the ambience the restaurant is trying to emulate. For grand, fine dining spaces, restaurant lighting ideas revolve around a focus on accent lighting with dim ambient lights to highlight key areas while keeping the mood romantic. You can also install a light suitable to highlight a bar counter like strip lights to accentuate the area while adding a decorative, grand chandelier across the room to make the room feel grand.
There are several ways to make your store brighter.
- You could change to LED bulbs that produce more lumens per watt to up the brightness.
- You can change the tone of your bulbs to a cooler setting, to brighten up the space as too many warm lights can make the area dull.
- You can add mirrors on your walls to reflect light beautifully and brighten up the space without adding new lights.
- You could increase the amount of ambient light in your space.
Making your showroom more attractive to customers is a strategic process and an art. It involves choosing the right type of lighting, adding attention-seeking signage and posters, using pop of colour in your store's interior design, aesthetically displaying your product, triggering other senses like smell by adding an iconic perfume and many more!
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