Access Fixtures lights manufacturers, Olympic-size swimming pools
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Access Fixtures CEO Steven Rothschild.
Worcester lighting fixture producer Access Fixtures has found success in supplying lighting solutions to a variety of niche markets, including sports, industrial, manufacturing and other uses. The company continues to produce new products and innovate along the way. In an interview, CEO Steven Rothschild spoke about the company’s expertise in lighting.
When was the company founded?
2009
What does Access Fixtures specialize in?
We specialize in high-performance lighting solutions, which is primarily around the commercial, industrial and sports lighting industry.
The company produces a lot of lights for the sports industry. Why is that a niche market?
Everything we do is LED. That requires the ability to both take high-powered LED luminaires, make them stable and long-lasting, and control the optics and beam spread to project the lighting where you need it to go.
We provide a comprehensive system at a reasonable cost to operate.
How many projects does Access do on tennis or volleyball courts?
We do everything from universities to country clubs to municipal facilities. We’ve done them all around the world, including in the Middle East and Caribbean.
If you start to take these market segments and build them together, you end up with some significant markets that are viable and worth growing in. If you specialize in just bocce courts -- which we also do -- you would probably go hungry. But we do bocce courts, gymnasiums, indoor pools and volleyball courts.
We just did a project for a large homeowners association in the South. They have an Olympic-size pool and area for competitions and big area off of that for relaxing. They had about eight tennis courts there and wanted to illuminate it all with LED lighting.
We offered an extra benefit and were able to make the whole system dimmable so at night they could host parties and receptions around the pool. They went nuts and loved it.
Your company supplies lighting to manufacturing and industrial uses as well?
We recently introduced a new LED light that emits no UV and no light below 450 nanometers for cleanroom and production facilities.
Those facilities before were using fluorescent lighting covered in what they call a gold filter. These fixtures would flicker and were limited in spectrum. The covering on the fixture would break down over time with heat. Lamps would emit UV and that would disrupt production underneath.
Our entire fixture is submersible and the spectrum is more broad, creating more visible light for workers to work under. It’s a superior product.
The cannabis industry is heavily reliant on lighting to help grow marijuana plants. Has Access Fixtures started working with that industry?
We’ve been approached and are working on designs right now. We actually have some that are actually being tested to grow cannabis.
We have lights able to enhance the Emerson effect and deal with reds and far feds required for flowering. All of that stuff is being tested now.
We’re a small company so there’s only so many markets to chase simultaneously, but we are pursuing this one.
The company doesn’t have its own factory but utilizes contract manufacturers to produce the products. Why not do everything in house?
The cost of scaling a company today is significant. Trying to be the best at every aspect of what’s required is virtually impossible. It’s much easier to use somebody else’s workforce and someone else’s tools and their physical plant than to build our own.
This interview was conducted and edited for length and clarity by WBJ Staff Writer Zachary Comeau.
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