Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome to the podcast about lighting matters. Our unflinching conversations uncover the nuances and complexities which shape the craft of lighting design.
[00:00:09] Speaker B: We explore the pivotal whys behind a lighting designer's choices and find honest answers to your most challenging lighting questions. Because lighting matters.
[00:00:19] Speaker A: Yeah. Cause I think I am a huge fan of that moment, too. But talk a little bit more about that magic moment.
[00:00:26] Speaker C: Well, so what happens is, the first thing that happens is we've been away from the project for a. A long time because we not dating the owner anymore. And then we get a call from our client, and our client says the lighting came back and it's way over budget.
Shocker, shocker.
So. And then they have a suggestion. They know how to fix it on the phone.
We have to cut. We have to cut lighting.
[00:00:59] Speaker A: We just have to cut it.
It's too expensive. You got too much light. We just have to change it.
[00:01:04] Speaker C: We gotta cut lighting. So they're assuming that I'm going to say, yes, that's right. We have to do that. I'll get right on it.
Be back to you by the end of the day with a package that fits under the budget that some phantom told you about. So let me get right to that.
I'll stop all the other stuff I was doing, and I'll skip lunch and I'll get on it.
[00:01:34] Speaker A: And I haven't heard from you for 18 months.
[00:01:36] Speaker C: I know.
[00:01:38] Speaker A: And now I.
God, this happens every day.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: No, you're only laughing to stop yourself from crying.
[00:01:49] Speaker C: It's only funny because it's true. So, so our first response is like, no, we don't. And let us digest this for a moment. Give us every bit of information you got, even if you think we don't need it, send it. Right? And we're gonna do a quick forensic dive into this bogus document that someone gave to you. Right. And we're gonna help you interpret that document and show you where, where the bodies are buried in this bid. Right? And there's going to be a bunch of bodies in this bid. And so we, because we have this pricing that we created a year and a half before, and we have names and times and where the numbers came from and people to reference human beings, not just like, oh, the distributor told us that. Like this nameless, faceless entity, the distributor or the rep. Like, we got names. And so we start unraveling it. We might call the rep and say, a first line of defense might call the rep and say, hey, what did you hear about the pricing of this project?
Generally, they might have already whispered to us a long time ago, back in bid. Hey, this is getting squirrely. You should have your ears up about this. Okay. All right. So it's kind of in the back of our head. Yeah, project's probably going to be a problem. You know, twelve months from now, it's going to be a problem. So once we do our sort of forensic dive, and of course, you just have that big number to deal with, you just have the non line item pricing number. So that is a phantom in itself. But then you come back and you can quantify and you can say, hey, this piece of paper says this project was not over budget.
When it left our hands, this project was not over budget. So something untoward has happened in the process that has derailed this. And so let's get everyone together, let's get everyone on a call, and let's get ready to make some people uncomfortable, because that's what it takes, is making people uncomfortable.
And I referenced this earlier, righteous anger is just, it's just awesome to have. You got to be right. You really have to be right, because when you're going to cut loose on a bunch of strangers and wield your prima Donnan out there and start yelling and screaming at people, you better be right.
It's very important to be right. But when you are, it is the most liberating thing in the universe.
And so when you can smell the rat and when you can flush the rat out, it is a just a. It's. It's the moment when hopefully your client looks at you and goes, wow, that you were worth every penny we paid you right at that moment. Now I see the value.
Forget that beautiful sconce you pick.
Forget that moment. That moment's gone. This moment right here. Because you are now helping the project be realized.
When you. When you do that right, because there's a stop, there's a stoppage. At that point, you know, when the thing was over budget, everything stopped.
And then a bunch of other bad actors hopped in with, under the, under the cloak of, we're going to help the project. We can help this project. I know how to fix this project. Like, you were never in a design meeting. You were never invested in this project.
I met a pilot at a bar, sitting at a bar, and a pilot flew private learjets around, and he used to train. He said, yeah, I taught flying for a long time. And he said to me, every student, every student that gets in a plane with you is trying to kill you every moment of the day.
And I thought about that analogy of, like, every contractor and distributor is trying to kill my work every day, all.
[00:06:05] Speaker A: For the gain of additional dollars, all.
[00:06:06] Speaker C: For some commas and zeros. All for commas and zeroes. Yeah.
[00:06:10] Speaker B: We're the only ones who are in it for the truth and beauty of best value to the client, the love.
[00:06:18] Speaker C: Of what we do. And also, you know, also proving our value to the project. Because you can build a building without us. You really can. And by the way, it goes on every day. Everybody's lighting design, everyone with a pair of eyes is a legging designer. That's right.
But when somebody invests in us, when a client invests in us, I just feel fiercely about protecting that. About if we managed to get $100,000 fee for a project that, you know, that I feel honored that someone invested in us. Just little old us, you know, we're consultants.
It's amazing that, to me, that people pay us to do the super fun thing that we do. This is not a job. This is a damn fun thing to do.
So. And it's the fact that somebody pays us to do it is even crazier. So when somebody threatens that, I get my hackles up like crazy, and it's like, go time. We designed a parking garage in Quincy, mass.
And for those who don't know, that's Boston adjacent, which is a tough market.
Boston, like. Like your market. I mean, it's a tough market.
And so we designed this thing, and we designed it. And when somebody comes to us and ask. Spends money for us to design lighting for a parking garage, you know, normally, electrical engineer designs lighting for parking garage, okay. But somebody comes to us, it's like, okay, we want a little extra, you know, a little razzle dazzle on a parking garage.
We had done one parking garage with this client before they came back. Return business on a parking garage. This is fantastic. I love it. So we put our heart and soul into this garage, and we designed it, and it was really cool. And the fact that we got some people to do stuff with a mundane structure like a parking drive, was also really cool.
And so we went out for pricing, and it came back, and it was about $200,000 over budget over what our dots on paper said it would cost.
And so I get the phone call from our client, our well meaning client, and she said to us, we have to cut lighting.
I was just like, I'm like, no, we don't. Take a deep breath. And so we started to do our. We started to do our thing and call the local reps and try to get to the bottom of it, you know, just on from the outside, try to get to the bottom of it.
And, you know, it was a big line item, not only a big, giant package price. And so contractor was selling the owner, who was then telling back to our client, you got to cut lighting.
We knew that was wrong. So we had this design scenario where we had six city standard poles that were going to be on the sidewalk in front of the building. But we had done this really unique lighting treatment for the exterior, and those acorn post top fixers were just going to puke light all over the outside of the building.
So we, early on in the design process, we had talked to our clients and, hey, do you think we could petition the town of Quincy that we could demonstrate that we could put light on the sidewalk from the building and then they would get rid of the light pulse?
And I said, okay, well, let's try that. So we made our case and the town Spencer said, yeah. So we affixed some linear led strips cantilevered off the side of the building, literally reached out the sidewalk at 11ft, 12ft, put lighting on the sidewalk. Boom. Poster gone. Okay, great.
So now back to our budget issue. We have this big fluffy number, which is $200,000 over what we asserted it would cost.
We don't have a magic crystal ball to look inside the price.
And I said to our client, I got an idea, they give us big number.
I said, where's the credit for the street pulse?
They owe the job of credit for the street pulse.
Ask the contractor to show you where the credit for the street pulse is.
Bam, we got you. They, they emailed line item pricing very proudly, demonstrating where the light credit for the light pulse was, along with everything else.
[00:11:13] Speaker B: Awesome.
[00:11:14] Speaker C: And we had them and it was like there was guilty parties everywhere.
Rep folks that I thought I was friends with, strangers I've never met, we had a DMX controller, which you can buy online for $1,800. They had it in for six grand, right?
Turned out, find out the lead linear portion of the project.
The rep at the time took the number from the manufacturer, doubled it and gave it to the distributor.
So all of these things piled up.
So then once we had that, once we got that, I said, now we're going to get on the phone, get everybody on the phone. And they thought they were getting on a phone call to help solve the problem. So everyone ran to the meeting.
The GC was on the call, the EC was on the call, the distributor was on the call, the owner's rep was on the call. Our client was on the call. I was on the call.
And we spent the next hour. I just spent the next hour just ripping through this crew of people. Every person who was involved, I just ripped. And the GC was furious, not with me, but with the electrical contractor, because he made. The electrical contractor made the GC look absolutely stupid in front of the owner. And that's the thing about joint contractors, is that when they hire a sub, they're trusting the sub is going to do the right thing by them.
And they aren't counting on some little dweeb popping his head up, not taking it, and coming, you know, coming to the meeting armed to the teeth, and willing to be really uncomfortable with a large group of people. And so I said, here's what we're all gonna do.
Here's what we're all gonna do. You're gonna put this package back out to bid, because I've spoken to everyone in the procurement chain, and they're all on notice about how this project went. So you put it out to bid and bring it back, and sure enough, it came back clean as a whistle. And it was just one of those moments that was like a very validating experience. And. But it took. It took a little trickery.
You know, it took trickery to make it work, which sucks, right? Because, you know, it's good that we pulled it off, but it's like, if I hadn't had that nugget and that moment hadn't popped up, we would just be. We'd be, you know, two blind fighters in a ring just, you know, punching in air.
[00:14:09] Speaker A: Right?
[00:14:09] Speaker B: I know. That's. That's something I always say. Like, I just. I'm so direct, and I just want to come right at the problem. And sometimes you have to kind of sneak around the side and.
[00:14:17] Speaker C: Yeah. Anybody, anybody, anybody who knows me knows that nuance is not my bag. Subtlety is. Subtlety is certainly not my back.
[00:14:25] Speaker B: I like to come straight at the problem.
[00:14:26] Speaker C: I'm old. I'm old and I'm tired, and let's get down to it, okay? Please.
[00:14:31] Speaker A: Well, and I think the other side of it, too, is, you know, in your description, you talk about it as a game, but if the other folks didn't play a game, then we wouldn't have to play a game, right?
[00:14:43] Speaker C: Y'all. Y'all did this, right?
[00:14:47] Speaker A: I'm reminded of a friend of a friend was talking. He was telling me he sells cars. He's a car salesman. And he said, and the conversation went, why are car salespeople liars? Why do they lie?
And he said back, and I always think about this, who lies first?
He said, 90% of the time you, the customer at a dealership, are the first one to lie because you say you want to buy. He said the easiest one is you say you want to buy cash, but the reality is you want to finance it, so you lied first.
So if you're going to lie first, then I have to lie. And then we start to play the game of buying this car. I think it's the same thing here, right? If they were to have followed your spec and provided line item pricing and done all of those things, then the conversation may have been, hey, we're a little bit over budget after all the markups and all this other thing. Okay, great, what do we do? And then that's when you can have a conversation to say, hey, led linear like you were talking about, can you get 1% out of this? They're ready to buy, right? Can you do this? Can you do that? But when you play the game, the contractors are going to look bad. And if you don't think, if any of those contractors or any contractor listen to this podcast doesn't think that lighting designers are doing all of this, and then you're going to bid it and you're going to magically win because it's not going to happen.
[00:16:24] Speaker C: Yeah, that only works. They're only trained to do that because they've been able to do that. It's a learned behavior on their part. Right. And so when I came into this area, as I said before, this is a specified, this was a contractor distributor driven market. And so that meant if reps did a lot of work and they called on the EE's, which were mostly just ee's here and the es who have another job to do. But they also got saddled with specifying the lighting.
The rep says, oh, you want downlight a will suit you. And he says, great, downlight a, put a schedule and the schedule comes out. And every rep agency in the area bids that schedule, the whole schedule, whether they're on it or not.
And then that package comes back to the ee who's busy doing other things. And he looks at that and says, okay, all these things seem to be right, okay, good, stamp approved.
Right, move on. So the rep who did all of that work to show them the downlight a, you know, they lost outd. And so distributors here and contractors here would know, just bid the whole thing and they're going to do what you tell them, because they need an easy day at work. They need to. And so it's a learned behavior. It's a systemic behavior that is that a disruptor? Who is. Anybody who is willing to fight for a spec, hold a spec, get someone on the phone, and make them uncomfortable, is a disruptor in that chain.
[00:18:06] Speaker B: I love being a disruptor.
[00:18:09] Speaker C: It's. Again, it gets me out of bed in the morning.
[00:18:13] Speaker B: I have to admit, though, coming into this career, I did not know how much this would be a part of my job. Right. If I want to get this design that I put my heart and soul into, then on the other end of it, I've got to. To defend it, play this game, figure out, find the rats. Everything we've talked about today talked to.
[00:18:33] Speaker C: A lot of entry level people who come into this industry, and particularly, we hire a lot of theatrical based people.
We start there, and we can teach them to be architectural lighting designers easier than the other way around.
And I said, when you came into college and you were doing your.
Your master's play that you were doing, or your bachelor's play that you did for your program, everybody on that crew wanted the same outcome as you.
Everybody from the director, the kid I was directing, to the tech crew who's learning, everybody could have just gotten the middle of the stage, held hands, sing Kumbaya. We all want this show to be great, and everyone's going to do their part to be great. I said, you're out here, in particular in the architectural world, where, I hate to say this to you, kid, but it's nothing like that. We on this team want it to be great. Sometimes our client doesn't have a vision for what wants to be great, and they're trying to get it done. And so you're going to meet a bunch of bad actors out there that are not invested in what you're invested in, that are not beholden to the idea of truth and beauty. They have their own agenda, their own incentives, and you are not part of it.
You are in the way of it. As a matter of fact, you're actually in the way of it. And so you're going to have to harden yourself a little bit and realize that to make your vision and to make the owner's vision come true, you're gonna have to do more than be a designer.
As you said, Lisa, you spend a lot of your time guarding the project, not doing design work.
Design work is way behind you.
[00:20:31] Speaker B: Great design is a lot easier than actually seeing it come to fruition.
[00:20:36] Speaker C: Getting a project. I mean, we have a great design process for twelve months or 18 months that we designed a project and you feel really good about it, you let it go, and then the things start to happen. One thing happens and it sort of compounds on another thing, and then it makes you start to doubt whether this project will ever get built and will I be proud of it? Will I want to show somebody this?
That was such a big sigh and it's so disheartening. And I try to shield that from the designers and stuff that work on it because I, I don't want them to. I don't want them to have to feel that way about their work. But there's a bunch of bad actors out there that have set their sights on your project and your project is going to become potentially victim. I know we're all being not cynical, we're being factual. And if someone listened to this, well, the whole industry sucks. Well, it kind of does, but, I mean, it doesn't have to.
[00:21:45] Speaker B: You've framed it as bad actors and a lot of times it is, but a lot of times it's just ignorance. They do not know that you specified that product, that when you specified that product, you were thinking about the colors of the walls, you were thinking about the sheen of the finishes, you were thinking about the viewing angle. You know, like, they have no idea. Everything that we thought about.
[00:22:08] Speaker C: Very recently, we were brought into a call about a project that was, of course, over budget. And they got the contractor on the call and the contractor had been asked by the GC to provide value engineering and they wanted to show us what they came up with. So we get on the call and I'm like, okay, this will be a fun exercise. Let's see what we're talking about here.
[00:22:37] Speaker A: My entertainment for the day.
[00:22:39] Speaker C: Yeah. Okay, I got an hour to burn on this. Let's go. And the first thing out of the gate was, okay, so you had all of these linear RGBW fixtures that are surrounding this drum structure that you can see from miles away and the interstate and all this stuff. And if we just put, we could do this with six floodlights.
So I think that we could probably, like here, I think we could probably save, I think, 17 or $18,000 here, just some arbitrary number. And, and I sitting here and I'm listening. And so in this call, there's probably twelve people on this call. I said, let me stop you right there.
And I said to our client, I said, bob, are we here to entertain design revisions in the name of value engineering?
Or are we looking at value engineering, the design decisions we made with something that performs the same way but costs less money?
And a couple people started as, excuse me, I'm just talking to Bob for a second.
And so Bob goes, no, we are not entertaining deviations or revised design ideas at this point.
And I was like, okay.
And it was about 30 seconds of really awkward silence.
Well, this calls over, isn't it? Right? And so the contractor said, well, you know, we're just really trying to. I know you're trying to help out. You're doing your best. You're doing what you were asked to do, and that's not your fault that you were asked to do that. Right? I. But you were not in any design meetings. You have not lived with this project for 16 months. You don't know any of the directives. You, in a vacuum, are doing what some DNA told you to do in your nature. I was like, okay, we don't think that. We don't know the port contractor. He doesn't know our input or value, any of it. And he just said, well, we could just put spotlights around the drummer, just point them at the drum, and we could save you 17 or 170,000 or whatever it is, you know, pick a number. It doesn't matter. And, like, so I. Once we made a point, then the. Then Bob, we'll just call him Bob then took it from that point as a voice of authority on the call to say, without the owner's input, we are not, you know, like, and the owner's rep was on a call. He's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm like, this is the outside of an iconic building that people are going to see forever, which is the attractiveness to me about what we do, the sense of permanence, and that people will enjoy our work for generations to come. Far, maybe even after we're gone. And so, like, you're going to wreck it, and you didn't mean to not wreck it. It wasn't your, you know, you weren't. You weren't a bad actor. You were doing what you were asked. But unchecked, left unchecked, that would be just horrendous. And then, you know, the owner, the opening day, when they turned the switch on, the owners sitting like, what is that?
Well, that is the money that you saved, allegedly.
[00:26:25] Speaker B: Derek designed that right there.
[00:26:28] Speaker A: Like, the rendering. Why doesn't it look like the rendering?
[00:26:31] Speaker C: It doesn't. But do you remember the money you saved? It was $17,000 you saved. So was that. Are you good with the $17,000? Did that buy for the shrimp cocktail at the opening reception? What did you do? And so that trade off that they don't understand because they get lulled into commas and zeros, not understanding the impact of what that does later when their expectations aren't met, and then it is all too late. It's just too late. Right? So these moments are enlightening. And I actually had our designer off on the call with me, and we went through, we let the guy, because he took the time to get on the call. We let him walk through all those different things, and we just explained to him why that was not physically possible or that doesn't satisfy this. And I think he felt kind of bad because he was put in a spot like a good soldier to complete a task that he was never going to be allowed to do. So I kind of felt bad for him. But I talked to my designer the next day in a project, and he said, dude, that was a masterclass.
And I said, you know, I said, you know, I felt bad. And so I was not my normal.
I didn't feel like he was a bad actor. I felt like he was someone on a. On a misguided mission. So I did not open up a can of whoop ass on this, on this person, although I did. I did catch him in a moment when he brought a rep to the meeting.
He brought a rep to this meeting. So that's a whole nother little moment that I called him out on. I said, I noticed that you have Bob from x rep agency on the call. And he said, yes. Well, he's helping us put together these value engineering issues, this moments. And I said, well. I said, well, does that mean that you are only entertaining value engineering moments from within Bob's line card?
And I'm sure a bunch of people on the call are like, what does that mean? What's he talking about?
He said, no, no, no. He just volunteered to come in and sit on the call and take. I was like, oh, Bob, I know you're doing pop. So it exists on a lot of very fluid levels. The game and the actors. Some are well meaning, some are misguided, some are bad. And to be able to adjust and pivot to it every day is a skill set that I never thought I would.
I mean, I never thought a thing. I just learned this through the process of learning.
And you go to lighting design school, which I did not go to lightning design school, but when you go to lightning design school, I'm assuming no one teaches this class, but I would love to teach this class.
[00:29:33] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. Well, and there's so many other aspects that we've just touched on, but I think that we'll have to come back to it in another discussion.
Derek, I appreciate so much you joining us today.
I love this conversation, and I hope this is just the beginning of continuing to put this out there and talking about it.
This is, amongst many things, I think this is one of the great values, one of many values you get with hiring an independent lighting designer, such as available light and RBLDi LBLD and more lights.
[00:30:24] Speaker C: Right.
[00:30:24] Speaker A: Like, and all the other IAld members.
[00:30:28] Speaker C: That are out there, the more designers that are turned on to this understanding, I think will ensure that more design makes its way out into the world. Because the end result of a lot of what we've talked about is an altered or neutered version of your design and ultimately the owner's vision.
And so now that vision was changed, altered in a way. So the more people that we can get in our industry, at the design industry, on board with understanding the games, being educated on it, and not being scared of it, not like, shying away from it, because you're fighting for the owner's vision, who trusted you with this mission, and if you don't fight for it, you're doing a disservice to the owner, you're doing a disservice to yourself. You're doing a disservice to all of us in our industry, because we're all just trying to fight to get our design out there in the way that we saw it. And so the more, I think, the more our community can be aware of this and comfortable with it, then more design will be realized again.
[00:31:49] Speaker A: When Lisa and I started talking about this podcast, this is a topic that we wanted to make sure we got out there and to be our second podcast, it really gets me excited, and I think there is going to be more discussion on this in this podcast and hopefully beyond this podcast.
[00:32:11] Speaker B: Yeah, there has to be. It was.
I felt like it was a scary topic for us to cover because you start to step on some toes.
[00:32:20] Speaker C: Oh, yeah.
[00:32:21] Speaker B: But again, thanks, Derek.
[00:32:24] Speaker C: Just gonna leave you with the notion you gotta be comfortable with making people uncomfortable. If you want to realize your vision, harden up and. And fight for it. Ultimately, that's what we're talking about, fighting for your. Your vision. So, thanks for the forum. And, you know, this is, this conversation happens at every bar, at every lighting conference. Anyway, so we just cleaned it up with slightly less profanity.
[00:32:49] Speaker A: Well. And we also want to make sure that we thank Lighting Services, Inc. LSI for their sponsorship of today's podcast. As I read my script to the right screen, I will move it over. LSI is celebrating their 66th anniversary and is the premier us manufacturer of track, accent, display and exhibit lighting systems. As we said before, it's one of more light's favorites. And it sounds like it's our other members here too. It's our Aspec Aspec LSI designs and manufactures premium quality architectural lighting fixtures. Their products are control agnostic, integrating control, simplicity and feature an industry leading twelve year warranty.
[00:33:34] Speaker B: Their reputation for creativity, innovative design, and leading technology coupled with intelligent personalized service has made them the manufacturer of choice among the most discriminating specifiers in lighting. Visit Lighting Services, Inc. At www.lightingservicesinc.com to learn more.
[00:33:59] Speaker C: Dan, Ken and Brian are my heroes.
[00:34:02] Speaker A: And you can always get a hold of them. I mean, that's the best part.
[00:34:05] Speaker C: They answer the phone. They answer the phone. It's crazy.
[00:34:08] Speaker A: Thanks again and I appreciate it.
[00:34:11] Speaker C: And yeah, I'll see you at a conference bar soon.
[00:34:17] Speaker A: Yes, with a few more explorers.
[00:34:19] Speaker C: Every tip with more profanity.
[00:34:22] Speaker B: Thanks, Derek.
[00:34:23] Speaker C: All right, have a great day everybody.
[00:34:25] Speaker B: Lighting matters as we wrap to wrap up, we want to reiterate how much we value your time, and we hope you found it as much fun to listen to as we had creating it. Remember to like it, and share this content with your friends and colleagues.
[00:34:41] Speaker A: The opinions expressed are those of the participants and do not necessarily reflect the official positions of the sponsors. Our content has general application, but we recommend obtaining personalized guidance from a professional iald lighting designer such as RBLD or more lights for your next endeavor.
