Shedding Light Edison Never Imagined
Michelle Slatalla

ONLINE SHOPPER —November 11, 2004—You could take the long view and say my light bulb phobia dates to high school.

Had I only taken Physics 101, my irrational fears of buying the wrong bulb could have been easily avoided. Not only would I have known the difference between volts and watts, but also that there was nothing to fear from branching out into different shapes and sizes.

Instead, whenever a light bulb burns out, I act like I've never heard of Thomas Edison. Primitive fear takes over. I fret that the slightest deviation like, say, replacing a 40-watt appliance bulb with a 50-watt bulb, could cause my oven to explode. The information on a bulb package - jargon like 50W, 120V, PAR-38, Halogen, 25-degree beam spread, medium base - is no comfort. It only convinces me that there are a lot of things that could go wrong.

For years I coped by using the burned-out bulb as a visual aid. The crazy person in the light bulb aisle, cradling an old 65W, 120V, Long Life, Indoor, R-30, Reflector, Medium Base as gently as a chicken egg? That was me, looking for a replacement.

Then last week the light bulb in my clothes closet burned out. I did not have a backup bulb. And I kept forgetting to drag a chair into the closet, climb on it, unscrew the bulb from the ceiling and then go to the store. I dressed in the dark for a couple of days - which served to reaffirm that medium-brown shoes do not mix well with dark-brown pants - and then I decided it was time to change.

My plan was bold and twofold. First I would educate myself about the mysteries of bulbs. If that meant admitting I didn't know the difference between incandescence and fluorescence, so be it. Then I would stock up on various kinds: appliance bulbs, recessed ceiling fixture bulbs, three-way incandescents for reading lamps. To improve the quality of lighting in my home, I would be willing to branch out into a brave new world of compact fluorescent globe bulbs and pink finishes.

Mike Connors, the vice president for sales and marketing at Bulbs.com, encouraged me in this endeavor.

"The days of the standard A bulb, your typical-looking Thomas Edison light bulb, are passé," Mr. Connors said, explaining why his site sells 3,500 kinds of bulbs, roughly 10 times as many as in a big bricks-and-mortar home-supply store. "As contractors are building homes with more sophisticated lighting systems, homeowners are seeing under-cabinet lighting and energy efficient lighting and spot lighting, and all those applications require different light bulbs."…

…Light bulbs have been confusing people like me since 1879, when Edison developed the first incandescent one that had a strong enough filament to last for several hours. But these days, each bulb presents its own challenges.

Take my closet bulb, for example. It was a 65-watt, incandescent reflector bulb that screwed into a recessed high-hat fixture. I knew enough to know that I shouldn't replace it with a regular old light bulb, but beyond that I needed help. I turned to Mr. Connors of Bulbs.com, who walked me through the process.

"In high-hats, you want a floodlight for a couple of reasons," he said. "They'll reflect light downward so you're not losing light out the sides of the bulb into the fixture."

The two obvious choices, he said, were a replacement reflector flood or a PAR 38 flood.

"P-A-R?" I asked.

"Parabolic aluminized reflector," he said. "You get a few more hours of life out of it, and it's a really nice, dimmable bulb. PAR lamps come in multiple beam spreads, to spread the light out on the floor, from a broad spread to a very narrow pinpoint. The spots go down to an 8- or a 9-degree beam spread."

"For my closet, what's the best beam spread?" I asked.

"In a home, I'd say you won't notice much difference between a 36-degree and a 60-degree beam spread," he said.

"Why get halogen instead of a compact fluorescent?" I asked, to show I had been paying attention to the online buying guides.

"Compact fluorescents are more energy efficient, but they're not recommended for use in enclosed fixtures because they have a ballast built into the base of the bulb that hasn't been perfected to absorb the heat that builds up," he said.

"Should I look for a bulb with a pink tint?" I asked, to trip him up.

"Pink lights will make skin tones more pleasing, which is why retailers and hotels will use pink lighting," he said. "But you might not want to have pink lighting in a place where you're putting makeup on. You won't get accurate lighting."

Two last questions. "What's so special about an appliance bulb? Why can't you use a regular bulb?"

"They're made with a heavier filament so they withstand some amount of vibration," he said. "They limit wattage because in those confined areas, you usually don't require as much."

I was ready to make bold choices. At Bulbs.com (where the minimum order is $20), I bought five three-ways (Philips, 50/100/150W, 120V, Soft White, 3 Contact, A-Type) for $1.75 apiece and two oven bulbs in the highest wattage I could find on the site (Philips 40W, 120V, Clear, Screw Base) for $1.99 each. Then I took advantage of a home page promotion to order 16 GE, 50W, 120V, PAR-38 Halogen Bulbs with 25° Beam Spread and Medium Base (diameter 4¾ inches) for $3.49 a piece. With tax and shipping, the total came to $81.44.

I'm looking forward to getting dressed in the light.

About Bulbs.com
Bulbs.com, headquartered in Worcester, Mass. is a leading online light bulb supplier. Launched in August 1999, Bulbs.com recently celebrated its five-year anniversary with record revenues adding to a growing list of over 21,000 commercial customers with over 50,000 locations in the hospitality, retail, property-management, healthcare, manufacturing and municipal sectors. The company is located at 40 Jackson Street, Worcester, Massachusetts, 01608, and can be reached by telephone at 508-363-2800 or on the Web at www.bulbs.com.