Natural Daylighting Systems shine bright in helping to increase sales, improve customer satisfaction and decrease overhead
A seminal study, Daylighting and Productivity by the environmental consulting firm, the Heschong Mahone Group, found that retail spaces lit with daylight increased sales by more than 40% over similar spaces selling comparable products.
Wal-Mart further confirmed this approach when it built its first energy-efficient model store in Kansas in 1993. The store was constructed with skylights on one half of the store. Tom Scay, the company’s vice president for real estate at the time, told the Wall Street Journal in 1995 that the products illuminated by the skylights sold much better than those under fluorescent lights.
The Benefits of Natural Lighting or “Daylighting” with Skylights
• Clothing, cosmetics, paint, home goods, furniture, flooring, and other retailers benefit from warm, natural lighting that enables the true colors to shine through. Artificial light has limited wavelengths, which can be too yellow or blue. The only way to see “true” color is in full-spectrum natural light.
• Daylighting increases foot traffic, as confirmed by a study done at the Eneref Institute. Customers interviewed for the study said that the stores felt more inviting. Customers felt more at ease at checkout counters lit with daylight. Salespeople felt more approachable under skylights and the shopping experience was more pleasant. Customers are more likely to spend more time in sunlit retail spaces.
• Retail staff working in sunlit environments are happier, more productive, and absent less often than those working for long hours under artificial lights.
• With a good thermal designed daylighting system, energy costs are reduced, and the retailer’s eco-friendly environment becomes an asset.
Companies like DayStar Systems (Campbell Hill, IL) have developed high-performance skylight systems that capture the sun’s natural light and collect, amplify, and diffuse a broad, even pattern of indoor illumination.