Sep 8, 2021
As the saying goes, “You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression.” This adage remains especially true for businesses and their signage; what a customer sees when they first see your sign may determine if they’re a lifelong customer or a missed opportunity. But your signage can do way more for your business than just attract customers. Below are six reasons to upgrade to an LED sign.
An easy way to make your signs stand out is to use LEDs to illuminate them. LEDs pack a much more significant punch in terms of brightness compared to fluorescent and neon lighting. With more lumens per watt, LEDs provide bright, clear, and vivid illumination that is significantly more visible from a distance than fluorescent and neon lighting. When you upgrade to an LED sign, you can easily capture the attention of customers, making them more likely to learn more about your business.
It's true; LED lighting is more expensive up-front than incandescent, fluorescent, and neon lights, but the up-front cost doesn’t paint the whole picture. The whole picture is truly painted by examining up-front costs, maintenance costs, repair costs, and the cost of use over time. Examining all of these factors helps determine your return on investment (ROI) and total cost of ownership (TCO). When you dive deeper into the true cost of LEDs, you find that they use up to 80 percent less energy than the previously mentioned light sources, which can equate to thousands of dollars saved each year in reduced wattage. This lowers the TCO and bolsters the ROI, and in some cases, the investment in LEDs can be recouped as quickly as one year.
Because LEDs are so energy efficient, they have great longevity; in fact, LEDs have been proven to last 50,000 to 100,000 hours. Depending on how many hours the lights are used each day, this can equate to 10 or more years of useful life. Compared to the shorter lifespan of neon (10,000 hours on average) and 32-watt, 48-inch fluorescent lamps (20,000 hours on average), it’s clear that upgrading to an LED sign is the right choice for sign longevity. And the longer you own your sign, the lower your TCO becomes.
Since LEDs have an incredibly long lifespan, it comes as no surprise that very little maintenance is required to keep your LED sign illuminated. As LEDs don’t burn out like incandescent, fluorescent, and neon, no time or money will ever be spent replacing them. And since maintenance costs are virtually eliminated, your TCO and ROI are also improved.
LEDs are Solid State Lights (SSLs), meaning they contain no gases and/or other compounds within a globe. This means that they don’t have a bulb that is susceptible to cracking or breaking. Further, they contain no glass and have a protective coating over the diode, so they contain virtually no breakable materials. Additionally, LEDs operate reliably under extreme temperatures. When you couple that with a weather-resistant sign that’s UL/cUL-rated, you’re set up for the best possible LED sign performance.
“Going green” has never been more important and is something to consider when choosing illuminated signage. Fluorescent and neon lighting both contain mercury — a dangerous chemical element that is extremely harmful to both humans and the environment — or other hazardous compounds, while LEDs do not. Because they don’t contain any harmful components, when LEDs reach their end of life, they are about 95 percent recyclable. With a much shorter life than LEDs, fluorescent, incandescent, and neon lights create significantly more waste and cause more harm to the environment when they reach their end of life and must be discarded. Finally, as LEDs run on lower voltage than neon, incandescent, and fluorescent lighting, they have a lower risk of catching fire and causing environmental damage.
Signal-Tech is the industry-leading LED sign company for the wholesale industry. If you’re ready to upgrade your business’s illuminated signage, we’re ready to furnish you with the best possible, long-lasting product. We offer guidance on what LED sign is best for your company and present you with countless ways to customize it.
Contact us today to learn more about upgrading your business’s illuminated signage!