ROI Warranty

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Bali 3^rd April 2013

Now here is an interesting approach to warranty. I met with several local lighting suppliers today to get a better feel on how to approach my specifications and long term maintenance recommendations. If my project is in Bali there is no point in specifying lights that can only be ordered from the US or Europe, at least for your general lighting types. So I always make it a point to catch up with the locally based suppliers, the ones literally having office “around the corner’, say within an hours’ drive of the site. These meetings can be illuminating to say the least as these are generally the people that (after you have gone, commissioned the project) that the maintenance engineers will turn to for their immediate lamp/ luminaire replacement needs; they generally don’t call Jakarta or even further away. They need their support locally…

So one of the local suppliers I met this morning, according to his explanations and the website I later checked (having a proper website is already a good sign…) specialised in LED lighting only (surprise, surprise). My first thought was, oh no probably another of those LED Cowboys…While only in business for about 5-6 years, their background in electronics and lighting controls looked promising. Still lot to learn in regards to lighting fitting design (all is locally assembled and tested), but again promising.

What struck me was his approach to warranty. Many promise a lot but deliver little. His approach to me was novel; he linked his warranty to the ROI (return on investment) of the product. In other word he would calculate the ROI and would then provide his warranty to minimally cover the ROI period, making sure the client would earn back his money, the additional cost of LED (yes you can calculate the ROI in many way, I know, but it’s the idea). So say if his ROI calculation would be 2.5 year he would give 3 years, something like that. There are always terms and conditions, but the idea is interesting and possibly worth some further consideration!

Light Watch 4-57: Being in a resort out in the sun away from the city made me think of the things people do to escape city life; and one of these things is building tree houses…adult versions of what some of us did when we were kids…