5.

7 Super/hypermarket
Techniques

General
The purpose of a super/hypermarket lighting scheme is to make the store as appealing
as possible to customers. It also needs to satisfy more down-to-earth requirements such as
facilitating orientation or to attract customer attention to special displays or points of
interests. Luminaires have to be chosen in order to underline and reinforce the individual
character of the shop brand or chain of stores. Colour appearance of the light
determines the overall ambience but colour rendering characteristics have a direct
impact on ensuring that the objects are shown to their best advantage.
The fundamental requirements for shop lighting could be as follows:
Creating atmosphere: the way goods are presented and lit, as well as the
general atmosphere, can positively influence a customer.
Creating interest: using accent lighting to create areas that make a customer
curious and wanting to see more.
Visual guidance: the lighting must help the customer navigate around the
shop.
Flexibility: marketing trends and initiatives change frequently and in order to
influence customers into rediscovering a shop it should be possible to easily
adapt the lighting to new requirements.
Lighting should allow consumers to examine the merchandise and should help
complete the sale.

General lighting
Main objective is to provide a background ambience and to give light for guidance,
especially in the case of frequent modifications to the store layout or promotions.
As well as good horizontal light levels vertical light levels are important as
shop goods tend to be held in vertical shelving units
As this is background store lighting a high uniformity is required
Luminaires should be placed perpendicular to shelving in order to facilitate
any reorganisation of the shelving and the possibility of variable spacing of
shelving due to different types of goods being sold in different areas.

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Key luminaires:

Accent lighting
By locally increasing or decreasing the quantity of light it is possible to create variation
in shadows and brightness. The aim of this is to give a maximum expression to
merchandise, enhancing form, texture and colour in contrast with the surroundings.
Ideally this should optimise the relationship between space, product and customer in
order to enhance the prospects of a sale.
Accent lighting should be at least 3x brighter than the surround to be
noticeable or 5x brighter to be meaningful.
Focal-point lighting, which highlights a specific central display with feature
merchandise, should be 10x brighter than the surround and generally uses
spotlighting
Display case lighting illuminates merchandise in glass or open cases and
shelves. It can be linear fluorescent or spotlighting depending on the type of
display
Perimeter lighting provides vertical illumination for merchandise along walls,
such as vertical shelving and can use valance systems or linear wall-washing
systems
Key luminaires:

Lighting clothing
The primary purpose of lighting is to make merchandise look good, increasing the
desirability of the item leading to a sale. When lighting clothing a flexible lighting
solution is needed to allow the lighting to be reconfigured when displays are altered or
moved. The market positioning of the store (high, mid, low-tier) should be considered
when designing the installation, and also the possible options for display, as clothing

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 Super/hypermarket
may be hung on rails, displayed on shelves or shown in an entirely novel way. Differing
materials used in the design of the display fittings and the size of the displays will require
differing lighting techniques. However lighting should remain discrete to ensure the main
focus is the merchandise, and should be as efficient as practicable.
One of the main issues with clothing is colour rendering and colour
temperature. Customers need to see the items they are thinking of buying in a
quality of light that shows the garment correctly. Any post purchase
dissatisfaction when seeing the article in the daylight must be avoided. The
Ra of the lamp must be at least 85 so that colours are reproduced as faithfully
as possible. Also note that the UV characteristics of the lamp should be
checked to ensure that it is suitable for the material being lit and will cause no
effects such as fading of colours.
New generations of metal halide lamp offer a wide choice of warm or cool
white light. LEDs with their improved performance are also becoming more
widely used. LED luminaires can be smaller and easy to blend into the
background. However, downlights and track mounted spotlights remain the
most common fixtures.
Key luminaires:

Greengrocery
Main objectives are to ensure that fruits and vegetables are shown under the best colour
rendering bright light. Using specific type of lamps that create colourful accents can
bring out freshness of produce. Warm accents are preferred with a low content of
actinic radiations (to prevent fading of colour in goods) and low heat radiation.
This kind of light is often realised with suspended structures hanging above
the displays allowing spotlights integration.
Key luminaires:

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Super/hypermarket
Bakery, cheese and delicatessen
A warm, oven-fresh appearance can be created on the bread, while cream pastries
appear appetising when illuminated by halogen lamps or warm white metal halide.
Key luminaires:

Wines and spirits

A lower lighting level helps to recreate the atmosphere of a wine cellar. With lower dark
ceilings mounted with fluorescent downlights the atmosphere may be emphasised further.
Key luminaires:

Fresh food counters

The ceiling is often lower than in the rest of the hypermarket. Recessed luminaires
provide a good illuminance level, accentuating the freshness of the displays with a
combination of different high Ra colour lamps.
Key luminaires:

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 Super/hypermarket
Task lighting
This provides illumination for a specific functional area such as the checkout counter. This
is not to be confused with accent or focal-point lighting. Particular attention has to be
paid to avoid any glare at the cashier position in order to assure a comfortable activity
with no mistakes. The area beyond the checkout should be lit to a level that provides a
transition zone for shoppers leaving the supermarket and going into daylight or the dark
of night.
Key luminaires:

Guidance
Indoor guidance - due to the diversity of goods a clear communication with colours,
graphemes, and lighting has to be established in order to guide customers. This
guidance is sometimes mandatory for safety reasons: exit ways being indicated in case
of emergency evacuations.
Key luminaires:

Signage
Additional to guidance the use of lighting to signal locations and features is important.
For outdoor lighting, facades, communication, logos, etc. help present the sales policy
and brand positioning.
Key luminaires:

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Super/hypermarket
Schemes
Super-store

Scheme: Computer super-store, 37m x 51m x 7m

Luminaire(s) used: Primata II 2x58W T26 with 5m mounting height, Sirios 150W HIT-DE
(spotlight) and 2x55W Voyager Twinspot (emergency lighting)
Sales area: Eav = 802 lux ; Emin/Eav = 0.68

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 Super/hypermarket
Schemes
Hypermarket

Scheme: Hypermarket, 80m x 63m

Luminaire(s) used: Arena 2x70W T26
Floor: Eav = 560 lux ; Emin/Eav = 0.76

Scheme: Hypermarket, 80m x 63m

Luminaire(s) used: Arena 2x70W T26
Floor: Eav = 980 lux ; Emin/Eav = 0.83

Wall-washing luminaires illuminating food products on shelving.

It is important to ensure a good level of vertical illuminance
on shelving so that products are adequately lit. Colour of light
can make a large impact on the appearance of goods and
should be carefully matched to the requirements of the product
on display.

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Super/hypermarket
The lighting should allow for large obstructions such as signage
and seasonal decorations to be displayed without causing
shadowing.

Lighting demands may vary across the store, with differing

store configuration and colour needs. Accent lighting along the
front of counters can make them stand out and appear more
welcoming.

Consideration should be given as to the goods being lit. Glass

and crystal objects should be made to sparkle, light appearing
to come from inside the object, whilst solid objects such as
clothes need to have light projected onto them.

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