Despite the indisputable business benefits of energy efficient commercial lighting, many small businesses have delayed making the switch to LED lights. Understandably, the past year or so has brought significant challenges to small businesses in all industries as they navigate unprecedented economic and social challenges. However, your business can’t afford not to switch to LED lighting. 

Upgrading to LED lighting doesn’t have to be hard, but there are several critical questions to be answered along the way. If you’re unfamiliar with your lighting options or haven’t managed an upgrade before, the thought of going it alone can be enough to make you put a project like this on the backburner.

Here’s what you need to know about switching to energy efficient commercial lighting with less hassle.

Understand Your Energy Efficient Commercial Lighting Options

There are many types of commercial lighting, and not all types are created equal. Depending on your business model, you may need to upgrade a single location or multiple locations across the country. 

Navigating all of the potential energy efficient lighting options and selecting the right lights for the right spaces can be overwhelming, especially with everything else you have going on running your business.

LED lights are the smart choice for nearly every type of business, from commercial to manufacturing to service to education campuses. With a 50,000-hour lamp life and serious energy efficiency benefits, switching to energy efficient commercial LED lights can lead to $10,000s in savings per year.

Decide if LED Lighting is Right for Your Business

When you’re upgrading your commercial lights to more energy efficient options, it’s important to find the right fit. Thankfully, LED lighting is extremely universal and there are lamp and fixture options for nearly every use.

This level of customization means you can easily outfit your entire location with energy efficient commercial lighting and really maximize your savings. But if you haven’t used LED lighting before, it can also be difficult to work through all these options and find just the right combination.  

Find the Right LED Lighting Partner

When you’re ready to upgrade, you can attempt to go it alone or pass the project to your in-house maintenance team. Smart businesses choose to maximize their investment by working with a full-service experienced partner. 

Working with an expert allows you to leverage all of their experience, not just with picking products but you can also rely on them to minimize downtime and disruption for your teams. A partner will walk you through the entire process from start to finish.

Choose an LED Lighting Model

When you’re ready to upgrade to LED lighting, you can purchase all the lamps and fixtures you need outright, but this can be cost prohibitive. To avoid this, some businesses may opt to upgrade one area at a time but this approach is extremely inefficient. Maintenance schedules will be inconsistent across your property, and lighting fixtures may be out of date by the time you finish your upgrade. This means starting all over again.

Savvy businesses are turning to the Lighting-as-a-Service (LaaS) model to upgrade quickly and affordably. When choosing a LaaS partner, businesses should look for one that:

• Maximizes savings
• Has experience in your industry
• Provides ongoing maintenance support
• Acts as a long-term partner

The difficulty of upgrading to LED lights depends on the approach you choose. Doing everything on your own, from planning to product selection to installation and maintenance, is significantly harder. It requires a deep knowledge of both your industry and LED lighting options. Without this knowledge, you may miss out on significant cost savings.

The easier and more efficient route is upgrading with a lighting service provider who can ensure you’re maximizing your savings, creating a healthier and safer environment and getting the most out of your upgrade. Upgrading to energy efficient commercial lighting doesn’t have to be cost prohibitive at all when you work with a LaaS partner.