Todd Reed: [00:00:00] Welcome to Keeping the Lights On. I'm your host, Todd Reid, and on this podcast I connect with the owners and pros who design, build, and maintain our electrical communications and industrial world to explore the best ways forward in this episode. I welcome Steve Lao. Business development manager specializing in industrial lighting applications for Graybar.

Steve is one of those people that has so many, many fascinating things going on in his life. We could spend three separate shows talking about how he's a passionate motorcyclist, collecting, repairing, and riding primarily vintage and European and Japanese bikes, or how he and his wife have traveled the world, including a driving tour of Hungary or rafting in Norway.

Even another episode on his 13 years as a Green Beret with 10th Special Forces Group, airborne No Less. But today we're gonna focus on his work in industrial and healthcare lighting. He is a certified as a lighting professional by NC Q L P A, well [00:01:00] certified professional Namco certified lighting controls professional and senior lighting technic.

Steve specializes in lighting renovation projects primarily in the industrial and healthcare space, but also undertakes projects in commercial, institutional and municipal areas. In this episode, we're gonna talk about what a plant owner or manager should think about when they begin to work on a lighting renovation project, be it a simple project, a light, a room to a complex relighting of the entire plant floor.

Let's get into the. When I started the show, I was gonna focus this segment on meals that my guests share with their coworkers. You know, company food traditions that, you know, the office, you know, you go to the same place all the time, but I'm noticing because of the way so many people work nowadays remotely, or in your case, you're always out with customers and kind of working, you know, at their locations all the time.

It's becoming more of about just celebrating the foods that are important to you, maybe in your hometown or otherwise. So Steve, I'm curious if I. To come into town or you had a [00:02:00] customer come into town, supplier, where would you take?

Steve LaJacono: Well, probably one of two places. Uh, a place most recently that I was at was, uh, called Little Hats Italian Market.

Uh, it's in Germantown, which is the sections Nashville, that's, uh, sort of a very old part of town, but becoming somewhat gentrified. But, um, uh, little hats is, uh, complete Italian, all sorts of artisanal, uh, Italian food products. And then of course, the. So you can get, uh, cold prep foods, uh, all kinds of Italian sandwiches.

It's, uh, it's pretty great. Plus you can sit outside.

Todd Reed: Oh, that's nice. What, how'd you discover it? A

Steve LaJacono: friend of mine had mentioned it and, uh, decided to go check it out. It was the site of, uh, actually a fish market before, uh, but they recently opened up a few months ago and it's, um, it's great. It's absolutely.

Todd Reed: Is it a fairly new place or, yeah,

Steve LaJacono: relatively new. Okay. Relatively new.

Todd Reed: Mm-hmm. . So what would you [00:03:00] recommend I get and or what is your favorite thing to get there?

Steve LaJacono: Oh, probably the traditional Italian, uh, sub, uh, which is just, uh, cap cola salami Ella with Italian dressing, obviously that's, and it's a hot sub, so it's, uh, it's just, One of my favorites.

Todd Reed: Is it one of those places that always has a long line, like you need to get there early for lunch? I'm just curious.

Steve LaJacono: Yeah. Saturday's tough . Yeah. But during the week, really, it's really not too bad. So, you know, typically you'll have a, you know, a 10 minute wait. Yeah, it's definitely worth the wait.

Cool. Well now I'm gonna have to get to Nashville and go to, uh, little Hats, right?

Little hats. Absolutely. Little hats. Italian market. Yeah.

Todd Reed: That sounds great. All right, well let's get into, you know, why we have you here today, uh, Steve. So a lot of the things that those people serve are made in some sort of factory or, you know, facility that's, uh, even though there are a lot of handmade stuff, I'm sure they have some stuff there that's made in a factory and Well, and that's [00:04:00] kind of where I think you spend a lot of your time, right, is in industrial.

Could be food, bev could be any kind of, uh, you know, manufacturing facility, if I understand correctly. And they call you because they have a lighting problem. Can you tell me, you, you mentioned when we were talking earlier that your role is kinda like a doctor seeing a patient and trying to, you know, trying to figure out why they don't feel good.

How, how is it similar in that way? ,

Steve LaJacono: it's, well, good analogy, but typically, uh, you know, industrial customers especially will have, you know, any number of issues occurring. Uh, It's too dark. It could be an older building. Uh, typically industrial plants, uh, you know, are 30 to 40 years old at a minimum. Uh, some are even older than that.

I was at one in, um, Baltimore, uh, just a couple of weeks ago that, uh, was a blockhouse constructed in about 1900. So it's, uh, over, obviously over a hundred years old. But, uh, it's, you know, low light, I mean, manufacturing [00:05:00] personnel, hard time, uh, maintaining equipment, seeing product, picking product. So it's, it's a low light.

I mean, that's, that's kind of the number one problem. Second problem is, uh, could be dirty power as an example, which is causing maintenance issues with existing lighting systems. And then third, and obviously a primary concern of industrial customers really is, uh, employee safety. So, you know, looking to make sure that they're, uh, mitigating trip hazards, mitigating, uh, accidental injuries on the job, uh, by providing obviously better light.

So

Todd Reed: those are the biggie. So I have some, uh, ties in with the lighting world, uh, being married to a designer myself. So, but, and I hear about this and so you can let me know if this happens in, in the, the world you work in too. A lot of times, um, customers will self-medicate to keep that medical analogy going.

right, some, what are some of the errors that happen in that, that self-medication, you know?

Steve LaJacono: The biggest one is, uh, probably wrong color temperature number [00:06:00] one. You know, the, in an area that needs, uh, 5,000 k, uh, correlated color temperature, it'll be putting in 3,500 k, uh, only because the person's selecting the lighting.

Usually from a big box retail store. Uht pick the right box. Uh, the second one is it's just the wrong fixture. It's the wrong fixture, the wrong lighting, distribution. It's just the wrong place. For a particular area of manufacturing or any kind of process, like a motorway, as an example, or an aisle. So those are good examples of, of those types of facilities, kind of, you know, self medicating.

Todd Reed: Do you have any other examples of, uh, some of the challenges you come across, uh, you know, specific or kind of plants and what you were running across?

Steve LaJacono: As a matter of fact, just this week I was in an office building in, let's just say Philadelphia. And , it's like, because if I say the exact location, they're probably gonna figure out who it was.

But it was in Philadelphia and, uh, ran across one of the offices that actually had a, a [00:07:00] sheet over the two by four fixture that was in the ceiling. obviously to kinda limit or, or filter the light actually coming out of that fixture because apparently it was too bright. So rather than installing the correct fixture in that office environment or even putting a dimmer on the wall, they decided to put a sheet over the fixture.

And I've seen that repeatedly. I've seen people put colored sheets over fixtures. Hmm. Matter of fact, I've posted those on LinkedIn. So, uh, yeah, you see all kinds of word stuff out.

Todd Reed: Yeah, I will mention to the listeners that uh, Steve does post a lot of interesting pictures from the jobs he's walking, which is kind of cool.

Just kinda gives you a before effect. And I assume, you know, this is funny. I don't know if I've seen 'em, but I'm sure you post after photos as well. But I see a lot of the priests and those are. He's very good. He doesn't tell where he is or anything, but it, it's, it's interesting. And that's, the colored sheet is very funny.

Yeah, those

Steve LaJacono: are, uh, yeah, those definitely happens more often than it, than it actually should. [00:08:00]

Todd Reed: so. Well, and you know, and I, I think part of it probably is, you know, I can see it in a plant or something there, you know, everywhere there's budget limitations and someone says, we need to fix this, so they're like, oh, okay.

I'll put a sheet over it. Okay. So, you know, from, you know, a layman's perspective, it, it seems like. and I don't spend any time in industrial plants. Honestly, most of my time spent in commercial spaces and retail and things. And it seems like most people have converted to l e d, so it seems like it. How big a problem is this?

I mean, what, what's the problem out there? It's

Steve LaJacono: still a very sizable problem. Uh, according to, uh, many of our, uh, strategic supplier lighting manufacturers, I mean, there's still about 85 billion square feet that has not. Converted to L E d. So, and I'm sure now you get in your car and you drive to work and you know, maybe if it's dusk or, or you know, still dark when you're driving in the morning and you see kind of those yellowish, uh, lights on the side of a building.

That's, that's a pretty good clue that that building has not been [00:09:00] converted. And it's just kind of shocking walking into some of these, especially large facilities like distribution centers that they're still running off, uh, you know, fluorescence or metal hay. , which are really kind of energy

Todd Reed: hog. Well, so, okay, so there's a lot of people that still need to fix it and it's not, from what I'm gathering, it's not just about just converting to l e d.

I mean, that's relatively easy, right? Cause that's pretty much what you can buy nowadays. for the most part, right? So I think the problem gets a little deeper than that, and we'll get into that a little bit later. But I do wanna start out with kind of like, so for the listener, like what's next? Like kind of what's your vision is for the future of lighting?

Like just, I don't know, just a few years down the road. Where do you think either we're going or you think you'd like to see it?

Steve LaJacono: I think the future of, uh, lighting in, uh, actually any commercial or industrial or even residential space is where all the lighting, uh, is controlled granularly. And what I mean by that is you control every single fixture individually, you're.

[00:10:00] Control zones, uh, become virtual. So in other words, if I'm in a manufacturing plant, man, I change my process layout. In other words, if I've got a line of one type of manufacturer here and I wanna move it to another part of the plant, I don't have to rewire the plant to change my zones. I can just do it from my iPhone or my iPad.

So, you know, eliminating. The element of human interaction from lighting. In other words, the lighting, the scenes are controlled automatically. When you walk into a room, the lights come on. When you leave the room, the lights go off. Lighting is, uh, dimmed down to a particular level when, uh, just automatically you've got lots of daylight harvesting.

So I, I think the adoption of controls throughout a facility and granular controls with controls on every single fixture is definitely the future of.

Todd Reed: Have you helped with the location that's kind of starting to move that

Steve LaJacono: direction? A couple of 'em actually. And, um, it makes a huge difference with regard to, um, uh, particularly energy savings [00:11:00] because, uh, as an example, uh, in an industrial plant I worked at, We installed granular controls throughout the facility, and the lights are, uh, pushed up to a hundred percent.

When the first shift comes in, 90 minutes into that shift, they dim the lights down to 85%, so automatically that's 15% savings off the top with no visible perceptible difference in the level of illumination throughout that plant. When the first shift leaves, the lights go back up to 100%. Second shift starts 90 minutes.

After the second shift starts, the lights go back down 85%. Again, no visible difference in, in the level of light, uh, for the workers on the, the manufacturing floor and so on, on and so forth. So companies can save. Uh, uh, you know, up to 55% more on energy consumption by the adoption of, uh, controls number one.

But secondly, granular controls. It just makes a huge difference.

Todd Reed: Hmm, Mr. Go. So that all happens automatically, right? They've [00:12:00] programmed that. Okay. And it can be

Steve LaJacono: programmed from your, literally from your phone, so it's great,

Todd Reed: right? Yeah, that's, that. That's good. So someone's concerned about their lighting, you know, From as simple as it's too dark to energy, or who knows a myriad of other reasons, but what's one of the first things that they need to ask themselves as they start to look at a, you know, at a lot of, at a lighting

Steve LaJacono: project.

As a customer, I think it's, it's gonna be become fairly evident that my building's too dark. So, you know, that visible indication that, uh, there should be more light in this space. Uh, I think that's probably number one. The second reason would be they wanna save money on energy consumption. So they realized that their electric bills throughout their plant or their whole enterprise or their office building, Kind of getting out of control.

I don't know of anybody whose electrical bill has ever gone down. So that's probably number, the number two indicator. And the number three, uh, reason really is, uh, I wanna be more green [00:13:00] conscious. Uh, I wanna lower my carbon footprint. I wanna, you know, plant tree seedlings and save gasoline, take cars off the road.

So doing that is, is also something we're starting to see more and more throughout, uh, the us, which is great.

Todd Reed: Yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so they realize their problem, but now what's the first question they should ask themselves to start looking for that right. Lighting solution?

Steve LaJacono: What is my intent for the space?

And it can differ greatly with, uh, any type of space that you're actually looking at. Obviously a museum is gonna be quite different than commercial office building or an art. Gallery's gonna be different than an industrial space or a large, you know, commercial, let's say, uh, gathering place is gonna. A whole lot different than a hospital.

So is it a, is it a lobby space that, uh, I wanna light, you know, correctly and create layer, a layered lighting environment that's very attractive and sort of to create an [00:14:00] impression when you enter that space. And then obviously, uh, tune lighting specifically to, you know, whatever. The owner's intent is for each individual space throughout that facility.

Uh, it's a bigger concern for office buildings as an example, as opposed to industrial spaces where they have, you know, large open spaces

Todd Reed: are, is, um, focused task lighting, something you see in the industrial space.

Steve LaJacono: Yes, all the time with auto manufacturers as an example, or OEM manufacturers that supply auto manufacturers with parts, they have very specific quality standards that, uh, they have to adhere to.

So having, uh, sufficient task lighting at inspection tables, at uh, QA tables, at individual work stations, uh, it's absolutely. Did a transmission plant a few years ago, uh, that supplies, uh, transmissions for our Mercedes, BMW, and Volkswagen. So obviously dealing [00:15:00] with very small parts, very, you know, fine part assembly with, you know, lots of assembly components.

It's really important that, uh, those manufacturers and those workers have sufficient liked to be able to meet those high quality standard.

Todd Reed: Okay. I'm about to ask a question. I know, um, I'm playing little devil's advocate here, but I see it myself and I'm not even lighting expert. Right. But, well, isn't the solution just more light?

No .

Steve LaJacono: It's not, it's not ask anyone who's who sat in an office building with the wrong, the wrong light above their head. You know, you can't, can't create what's called in the industry a glare bomb where it creates lots and lots of visual discomfort, and we have tools to actually measure that clear factor.

So you have to be very careful, uh, in order to create, uh, the right light with a very comfortable. Distribution and [00:16:00] brightness for the person that's at that particular station as an example. Okay,

Todd Reed: so you, you, you start to understand the intent of the space, like what are they trying to achieve? What's their business goals or whatever.

Mm-hmm. kinda start to figure that out, you know, and obviously you kind of figure out, okay, well how much light do you need? But what are some of the other things you could talk about? You've, you've brought up lighting controls, color temp, I feel like you mentioned something else. Can you just touch a little bit more on like some of the things that they can start thinking about, you know, with those two, maybe those two subjects and maybe others that maybe people don't think about when they think you know about.

Steve LaJacono: Well, controls is probably the first thing they don't think about with lighting. You know, the light's just there and you turn it on and off. So that is, uh, you know, the wall switch, you know, the on and off wall switch is the ultimate, very fundamental lighting control. It turns on, it has two states on and off, but people don't think about daylight harvesting as an example.

Hmm. So I can maintain equal levels of light throughout the facility with, you know, let's say lots of [00:17:00] window walls throughout the entire day. Uh, people don't think about circadian entrainment. For, you know, workers to be able to, that has a biological or a pathological effect on occupants of the space to help sleep cycles, you know, mitigate, you know, lots of what we call blue light.

So those are all sort of concepts that are being brought into the, the lighting renovation world in particular that, you know, typically a customer won't think.

Todd Reed: And I'm gonna have to ask you to maybe talk a little bit about circadian. Did you say entrainment? Yes. So what is, what is that? Can you touch on that a little bit?

Steve LaJacono: So, you know, we all have a, an awake sleep cycle and circadian treatment really very simply is, you know, you sort of wake up in the morning, the sunlight color is, uh, sort of more reddish that allows us to, uh, the body to actually. Become more a wig, more vigorous. You have the brightest light, you know, around [00:18:00] noon typically varies from wherever you live.

And then in the afternoon, as it gets towards dusk, the light color temperature then rather than become bluest at noon, becomes, uh, more red during, you know, dusk and, and twilight. Until nightfall. So it's sort of creates a, it's difficult to explain without a picture, but it actually, it helps the body metabolically just react more naturally to the built environment.

I think that's the, the best way I can say it. So it's more concerned about the occupants of the space as opposed to just, you know, blowing the place out with tons of light, with no consideration of color. .

Todd Reed: Okay. Well, you know, that's interesting. I have heard about, you know, this sort of thing, especially in schools for kids as they learn and mm-hmm.

But what's interesting to me is thinking about that just for you know, people that are in that factory, 40 plus hours a week, and that's, so it's interesting kind of setting that tone so it's more natural for them, you [00:19:00] know, as they work. And I assume it helps 'em be more productive and be a little bit more in rhythm to their body.

Steve LaJacono: At its foundation Yes. Is, you know, does the science sort of substantiate all that? There's been a number of, uh, studies that have been completed that, that actually, uh, are able to mimic that. But as the scientists will tell you, still a little bit early, but it definitely does have an impact.

Todd Reed: budgeting's always an issue for any sort of project and any, any business of any size, is there any studies and measurements on, you know, return on investment type of things

Steve LaJacono: based on with, uh, every project that we. . We provide a a 10 year lifecycle cost analysis, which is really an industry standard. We'll provide the, uh, project, uh, return and investment, the internal rate of return, and the project net present values so that a controller or a cfo, F O or uh, you know, your accounting person in your office can [00:20:00] easily compare that lighting renovation project to, let's say, you know, another CapEx project, like, you know, buying a new chiller or.

Getting new dumpsters or whatever it is that they do. So it's a very easy basis for them to fundamentally grasp. the value of that project? Well,

Todd Reed: I'm assuming that those reports don't talk about the impact, either financial or soft, uh, savings or improvements with culture, productivity, health, that sort of thing.

Right. Because you can't really claim that .

Steve LaJacono: Right. We try and stay away from, um, and I know the people at well are gonna get mad at me, but we try and stay away from soft dollar comparisons. Because they're intangibles, they're difficult for customers to, uh, actually grasp. Uh, we provide with all of our, uh, proposals, actually all the formulas that we use to calculate, uh, energy savings, to do all of our financial calculations to calculate their B T U savings.

Converting to L E D [00:21:00] on reducing H V A C loads. Uh, so all of that is very easy for customers to, you know, not only grasp, but their, their heart numbers. It's all math.

Todd Reed: Right. There's a lot of things to do in every, every location. that you visit. there are similarities, there's lots of little details and things, and I'm sure that make, you know, each problem unique.

But, you know, we'll, we'll put ways on contacting Steve and, uh, at the end of the show. But, so I do wanna close out, Steve, you know, were you focusing on the why of what you do, you know, what motivates you to do this day in and day out? What keeps you excited and passionate about what.

Steve LaJacono: Employment number one.

Hmm, interesting. Okay. So good. Every facility offers its own unique challenges. Uh, whether it's an industrial plant or a commercial office or a hospital, uh, physical therapy clinic in a strip mall, retail store, they're all different. And I think that provides the uniqueness. It's, it's refreshing. To [00:22:00] sort of view all of the problems that, the unique problems that these facilities kind of bring to the table and what we can do as an organization to, uh, help them meet those problems with effective and, and value-based solutions.

That sounds like a great commercial, doesn't it?

Todd Reed: It does. Let me clip that, uh, you know, , right? And we'll, we'll post that on the social media there. Good job reading the, uh, script there. Just kidding. Alright, well that's, that's great. I know. You know, like I said, I, I'm married to a lighting designer in every space we walk into.

She's craning her head and looking up into the lighting every single space. So now I do it. So that's, uh, uh, something she did

Steve LaJacono: that's called the lighting nerd effect.

Todd Reed: Yes, definitely, definitely that. Um, but it's a, it's a good thing. I support that. All right. Well, Steve, thank you so much for being here. It's been great, uh, having you on the.

Steve LaJacono: You're welcome. It's been a pleasure.

Todd Reed: That was my conversation with Steve Lao, business development manager specializing in industrial lighting applications for [00:23:00] Graybar. You can connect with Steve and what he is working on by heading to the links in the show notes. Now, here's what stood out to me from our conversation.

One. When thinking about a project, the place to start with is the intent of the space. You know, what am I trying to accomplish? What am I the people working on in that space, and how does it dictate how it should be lit? Two, the importance of color, temperature, a new, new words. I learned circadian entrainment, and the huge benefit of looking at controls beyond a simple switch and moving to more sophisticated controls that are more.

And can help me achieve my business goals as well as potentially helping provide a healthier environment for the team working in that space. Oh yeah. And number three more light isn't necessarily the answer to my lighting problems. If you enjoyed this episode, you can help us grow this show by leaving a five star rating in your favorite podcast player and even writing us a review in Apple Podcast.

So thank you so much for listening to this episode of Keeping the Lights on. We'll see you next time.[00:24:00]