FIRST Fundraiser: Selling LED "Lightbulbs"

[Brandon Holley]

Originally Posted by ebarker

The hard part, IMHO,

You have to sell a product that has a higher shelf price than a typical bulb, plus add in some profit margin for your team that raises the price even further.....

Total cost of ownership should be lower but it is still hard to get many people to buy the product because they tend to focus on the shelf price.

something to be aware of..........

This is a big challenge with current LED technology. However, with incandescents being phased out starting in 2012, until they are finally laid to rest in 2014, consumers are going to have to start looking at the problem differently.

The huge complaints with CFLs are the delayed on times combined with flicker and the blue light (high color temperature) the lights emit when being used.

With LEDs, consumers get the same instant on as you do a incandescent, combined with the warm (low color temperature) light that makes everyone feel warm and fuzzy.

Now add in the cost benefit and lifetime (~10 years+) and you end up with a very marketable product.

It may seem like a tough sell, but it most certainly is highly marketable. It's all about informing the customer of what's important.

-Brando

[Jared Russell]

I think that FIRST teams may have great luck in marketing these to local businesses, who may be more likely to take the long view when it comes to the cost of lighting than home consumers.

[ChuckDickerson]

Anyone know how well LED light bulbs work with dimmer switches?

I just replaced a bunch of the wall switches in my house with dimmer switches. From what I have found CFL lights don't seem to work well with the dimmer switches. Some say they work but they buzz and hum loudly when they are dimmed. Others just don't work unless the dimmer is almost all the way up. I would love to replace all the incandescent bulbs in my house with new more efficient technology but if I can't dim them down it sort of defeats the point of the dimmers. Is this a selling point of LED light bulbs or will they suffer the same issues?

[artdutra04]

I'm completely sold on LED bulbs as long, as their price efficiency beats CFLs. But the one problem I see is that a large percentage of the population doesn't understand even simple algebra and break-even points, let alone time value of money. Many people just look at the initial cost and base their opinions off of that, regardless of operating expenses or potential benefits. It's also why public works projects (improved highway interchange, expanded airport terminal, new high-speed rail line, etc) that engineers calculated to have positive cost/benefit analysis get shot down by politicians or voters who only see an initial price tag in the billions.

So the challenge for this fundraiser is to both sell people on a product, and sell people on the concept of thinking longer-term and considering operating costs, benefits and break-even points rather than just the initial expense.