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Thinking outside the box

Image of Chris Hanna from Boxmaster
Boxmaster Operations Manager Chris Hanna in their Delta facility, which recently got an LED lighting upgrade.

Packaging company unboxes better lighting and lower bills

Based on Annacis Island in Delta, Boxmaster has been successfully supplying corrugated packaging to many industries for almost 40 years. Boxmaster can make you a product to hold or display anything, from moving boxes at one end of the scale, to high end custom-made die-cut displays at the other.

"We service a lot of the food industry, like grocery stores and distribution centres," says Operations Manager, Chris Hanna. "So during the pandemic, we've stayed busy because people will always need food – and toilet paper, apparently."

Bright idea

Boxmaster wanted to improve energy efficiency, and increase overall lighting quality for employees throughout their entire facility, which includes offices, loading bays, a warehouse, electrical rooms, a lounge and a lunch room.

"We're always looking for capital projects that make sense for the company. And when you do the math with lighting, you're saving money pretty quick," says Chris.

"Our maintenance department was spending so much time going up and changing out multiple types of light bulbs. We would work around production to replace them at night and on the weekends. There are also some precarious areas where we'd need to bring in a boom lift. I'd read about LEDs on BC Hydro's website. So we started exploring what it would take."

Image of Andy from Radiance Energy
Andy from Radiance Energy.

No headaches

Chris's team worked with Radiance Energy to figure out a solution and get incentive approval from BC Hydro. "We were approved mid-summer, and then it was completed by November," says Chris. "BC Hydro were outstanding. I was really impressed. The communication was great. It was really straightforward. It was easy to apply. Any questions I had were answered directly, there were no delays in responses. And we got our rebate exactly when we were told we were going to get it."

Radiance Energy replaced all existing light bulbs with an improved, energy-efficient LED retrofit solution throughout all areas of Boxmaster warehouse facilities. And apart from being brighter, employees with lighting sensitivities will have fewer headaches and less eye-strain thanks to the new units.

The total cost of Boxmaster's project was $155K. But if you factor in the BC Hydro incentive of $72.8K along with lighting energy cost savings of 80% or 489,430 kWh annually, you can soon see how quickly LED lighting can pay for itself.

Lowest bill ever

"The financial impact has been great," Chris smiles. "We're always very busy in June, but we just had our lowest electricity bill ever."

But the positive effects of LED aren't just saving energy and reducing costs: "The lighting itself, the quality, is like night and day," says Chris. "Radiance told us that these LED lights are the closest you can get to sunlight and they didn't disappoint." The entire Boxmaster team have noticed a huge difference: "We have 70 employees in the plant, and anybody that we talk to says how excited they are about it and how much brighter and cleaner it is."

Get the latest COVID-19 advice for your business

Make sure your team and your business are benefitting from the latest B.C. Government advice on COVID-19, including their Support for Businesses information.

And of course, we're here to help. Reach out to your Key Account Manager or Regional Energy Manager if you have any questions or concerns.