Four cost lines, not one
Buyers compare the hardware price and then discover the artwork, the mounting hardware and the access costs. an advertising gobo projector is a system: light source, optics, a piece of custom glass, a bracket and somebody's time on a ladder. Quoting only the first of those produces budgets that do not survive the first year.
- Hardware — the fixture, lens and bracket
- Custom artwork — the gobo, and every re-cut after it
- Installation — access, power and making good
- Running cost — cleaning, power and replacement cycles
Hardware
Hardware scales with output and rating. an advertising gobo projector at the bottom of the 50–300 W range for a sheltered indoor position is a different product from one at the top of the range rated IP67 for an exposed facade — same category, very different bill. The jump is driven by the LED, the driver, the thermal design and the housing, in that order.
- Output, which sets the LED, driver and heatsink size
- Ingress rating, which sets the sealing and housing design
- Lens quality, which sets how much output reaches the wall
- Finish and hardware, which set how it survives the site
The recurring line
Custom artwork is the recurring line, and the one that gets forgotten. Every rebrand, every new branch, every seasonal change means another gobo; if you are running an advertising gobo projector across several sites, that is a standing cost, not an one-off. Standardise the gobo size across the estate and reorders become cheap and quick.
- Engraving per unit, and any minimum quantity
- Artwork preparation if the supplied file needs work
- Shipping, especially on small reorders
- Lead time, and the cost of waiting
The line that surprises people
The surprise lines are access and power. an advertising gobo projector that needs a cherry picker, or a new switched spur run across a finished ceiling, can cost more to install than to buy. Both are visible in a ten-minute survey, which is why the survey is the cheapest part of the job.
- Access equipment — ladder, scaffold or powered platform
- Power run and any making good afterwards
- Out-of-hours or trading-hours working
- Fixings, bracket and cable management
Total cost of ownership
Over three years the honest ranking usually changes. Add the hardware, the artwork reorders, the cleaning and the electricity, and the cheapest advertising gobo projector on the unit price is rarely the cheapest to own. The two variables that dominate are servicing access and gobo replacement frequency.
- Hardware, once
- Artwork reorders, every rebrand or new site
- Cleaning, twice a year
- Power, continuously
| Cost line | Frequency | What drives it |
|---|---|---|
| Hardware | Once | Output and ingress rating |
| Artwork | Every rebrand or new site | Number of sites and change frequency |
| Cleaning | Twice a year | Access method, mostly |
| Power | Continuously | Wattage and daily run hours |
Where to save and where not to
The false economies are the rating, the bracket and the artwork. an advertising gobo projector with an under-specified IP67 rating fails in the first winter; a lightweight bracket drifts and needs re-aiming; a low-resolution artwork file produces an image you will not accept. Save elsewhere.
- Reduce the image size before increasing the output
- Standardise the gobo size across every site
- Choose a surface with lower ambient light
- Keep the original vector artwork file
