Planning showroom technology correctly: lighting, sound and air conditioning

In interactive showrooms, in addition to the actual company presentation, the general room atmosphere should also be pleasant and coherent. Lighting (e.g. with LEDs), sound and air conditioning play a particularly important role here. To ensure that your visitors enjoy spending time in the showroom, this technology should be designed purposefully and with attention to detail. This is exactly what the following article is intended to help you with.

Lighting and Mood in a Showroom

No matter how beautiful the furniture and how flamboyant the surfaces – they all are in vain if they’re simply ignored by the lighting concept. Which is why you should aim your mental spotlight on the … well … spotlights. With only moderate effort, you can build up an atmospheric mood and create altering interactive lighting concepts.

Spot on the Technology Checklist:

• avoid reflection on monitors (light)
• must‑haves: accentuation, distinction between “show” light and “cleaning” light setting (full glare = full view)
• individually dirigible LEDs for targeted effects and animation
• central lighting control (e.g., via tablet PC)
• facilitate easy operation (also for Luddites and technical amateurs), for instance with pre-set lighting themes
• best practice: lighting control automation, according to the content on display and people’s position in the room

Image: varying lighting ambients within one room

 

Sound and Audio Experience in a Showroom

Not only the look and feel of your showroom are essential, but the acoustic component of the sensual experience as well. This includes – but doesn’t end with – video playbacks: good acoustics help your visitors to feel comfortable.

Once you have decided on a sound concept, you should get a professional sound designer on board to ensure its correct audial translation. If you’re working for a large corporation, perhaps there are corresponding guidelines and specifications already in place (e.g., in the CI directives) to help you with that.

A showroom’s essential audio and sound elements:

• reception/greeting/welcoming message (for instance, an intro film)
• background (ambient sound, typically addressing the subliminal perception)
• activity sounds (triggered by actions, exhibits, or presentations)
• exit/farewell (e.g., a combination of monitors dimming down and the room lights coming on)

All other specifications concerning the amplifier, sound-mixer, controlling, and speakers usually emerge in due course during the process.

Tip: Stay open for acoustic input from the future! Keep your audio system flexible and compatible enough for external partners and service providers (e.g., on special occasions and events) to be able to link up with it and use the existing infrastructure.

 

Showroom Air Conditioning and Climate Control

Good air-conditioning is an integral factor in a showroom providing pleasant conditions for visitors. Typically, air quality and temperature inside a showroom vary largely. For instance, interactive installations such as a monitor wall emit considerable heat, and with the presence of larger visitor groups the air quality gradually diminishes. However, you can and must compensate all these aspects in order to maintain a pleasant indoor climate for visitors. Especially with respect to the air’s possible viral load, the use of aerosol filters is highly recommendable.

Tip: When it comes to the air-condition, your showroom plays only silent movies. Other than effective, the air-conditioning in a showroom supposed to be one thing and one thing only: very, very silent.

This blog entry is an excerpt from our comprehensive whitepaper “Successful Planning and Realization of Corporate Showrooms – A guide from HOW to WOW”. If you would like to receive the whitepaper free of charge, please write an email with the subject “Whitepaper Showroom” to info@garamantis.com.