Over the course of the Church Energy Series we’ve been covering ways to get fast return on investment with upgrades to energy efficient lighting. We are wrapping up the lighting portion of the series and today we’ll dive into a more exciting topic: LED stage lights. Continue Reading →
Last time we discussed why your church should switch to CFL, LED, and/or Induction lighting ASAP to get fast church energy savings. Just how fast will upgrading pay you back? Today we take a look at two examples. Continue Reading →
Last time we discussed how the Church Energy Audit can help you track down the biggest energy wasters at your church facility. Now that you have a better idea of where you power is going (or not going) the next step in restoring your church’s use of energy is to set some energy savings goals.
Unless you plan on taking your church off the grid it is unrealistic to think you will be able to reach 100% energy efficient. It is mighty noble to say “we want to reduce our church’s energy consumption by 30%,” but you have to determine where you will find savings. Be specific. Look at each system and get estimates on energy savings and initial costs for upgrades/replacements. Start with the smallest culprits and work your way up.
House Lighting: Expect to save 75%-80% when switching from traditional incandescents to CFL’s or LED’s. Changing out old school gym lights (400W metal halides) will give you the biggest bang for your buck at 50%-70% if you switch to LEP (light emitting plasma). Depending on the size of your facility, upgrading your lighting fixtures could be your least expensive expenditure. If it looks like it would be too costly to upgrade all lighting at once, consider doing it in phases. Upgrading one zone per year or 6 months as you are able until the whole building is done. Consider that the savings cost you can achieve in just a few months may amount to thousands of dollars. Upgrading might just pay for itself!
AV & Stage Lighting: One of the biggest energy culprits in AV are likely to be audio amplifiers. If you still have a few remnants from last century’s workhorse amps in your AV rack it’s likely they not very energy efficient. For example the CROWN MICROTECH amplifiers produced in the 90’s and early 2000’s needed 11-26 amps where as a modern day Crown iTech amplifiers requires just 5-8 amps during a program or as little as 0.8amps in sleep mode (sleep mode is actually a recent addition to pro audio applications). That upgrade alone is a savings of 45%-70%. 93% savings when in sleep mode. Large format projectors also require a lot of power. Dimmer units are also big energy consumers. If your AV upgrade schedule includes audio amplifiers, projectors, or conversion to LED stage lighting fixtures, or LED Video walls, make sure you include considerations for energy efficiency in your specifications. There is significant energy savings to be had with upgrades. If replacing these AVL components all at once isn’t practical for your church, consider phasing the old workhorses out over time.
HVAC/Water: As you pinpoint your largest consumers within your facility by reviewing your church energy audit, the HVAC and water systems will likely be one of your biggest energy offenders. Your discussions with facility managers, leaders and consultants may tend to start here. Upgrading or replacing HVAC and Water systems can be quite a daunting task especially if your systems are 30+ years old. Unless it’s a matter of a smart thermostat or installing a digital water heater manager, you will probably be talking MAJOR INFRASTRUCTURE changes. The high costs associated with this level of upgrades can send sticker shock through your leadership. Still, there are energy savings to be had with upgrades to HVAC and water. Talk through this process with a qualified consultant to set an appropriate energy savings goal here.
Next time we will take a look at how churches can use automation for more smart energy savings.
Catching up with friends and family always brings a bombardment of questions about my recent move to Chicago and my new job. As a church audio engineer, the one question I get A LOT is “what is it with churches trying to be cool and hip with their use of technology all of a sudden?” I can see where they are coming from. Walking into a local mega church can be confusing. The experience for non-church goers can be like a mashup of a rock concert and Ted talk. Special events at the most advanced churches are bordering vegas show level production. Many are indeed confused with modern church’s use of technology and social media. Some say it is the church’s desperate attempt to remain relevant. “Isn’t the gospel enough?” they protest.
Some offer the great commission as their primary argument for the church going big with technology (google “Digital Missions”). I would like to offer a different argument for churches to embrace technology. The great commandment. Love.
Here are 5 ways the church loves through technology:
1. Streaming. Internet live streaming loves the church attender. It is a great tool to extend your church services and events outside of the physical church building. Folks who are sick can tune in from home, and people who are traveling can keep up with the latest series. These are great benefits for church regulars. Live streaming also loves the church seeker. Streaming provides a low pressure gateway for those who would like to check out your church without the intimidation of going to a big huge place for the first time (or a small place where everyone will ask them to stand and give their name and credentials). The hard work and thoughtfulness of a live stream can go a long way to introduce and connect people to your local body of Christ.
2. Big Data. Collecting data about the people you want to reach through your ministry gives churches important information about their local, national, and global community. Why make guesses or assumptions about your community, when you can have certainty about what’s important to them? Churches collect their data through email marketing, social media campaigns, polls, and surveys. These resources can help churches shape programming quickly. Churches can now make adjustments to reflect what their community cares about and needs. Then, analytics allow churches to measure their impact and reach. Churches can know exactly how they are doing at loving people. You can’t improve what you can’t measure. At least not efficiently and effectively.
3. Multi-site & simulcast church model allows churches to expand their reach while remaining local and small in feel. Getting a smaller church feel is important to many people who have difficulty finding community in large crowded mega churches. A small local church ensures that someone knows your name. It means you can find friends and community groups faster. It means you don’t have to travel far from where you live. It means you will likely be attending church with your actual neighbors (with whom you practice the great commandment). Many churches encourage us to live life in community, multi-site and simulcast build that motto into their structure.
4. Big Screens and Loud Sound. I know, I know, you want to go to church, not a live concert. You don’t know why there are huge screens and speakers coming at you from everywhere. Trust me, many churches have integrated modern Audio-Visual systems because they love you. Most church buildings were not designed with the congregation experience in mind. Many have poor sight lines and terrible acoustics. If you are siting in the back you can’t see the pulpit. If you are too far left, you can’t hear the worship leader or the pastor. Modern AV systems assist the artist and audience engagement through a range of music, dance, and other artistic expressions of worship while providing high intelligibility of spoken word. The big screens and loud sound systems ensure that every person in the room can hear and see.
5. Social Media is a means to engage people beyond Sunday and beyond the four walls of the church. The content your church produces can spark on-going conversation, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Your members can respond to and share your content with their networks, thus extending your church’s reach. That awesome point in the sermon, that song that speaks to someone’s experience. They can be shared over and over through likes, retweets, and re-blogs, for weeks and months after the service has ended. There is also now a record that people can search for, bookmark, and come back to, all online. These days you don’t even have to be at a computer, you can create and access social media from the phone in your pocket. The voice of the church is badly needed on the walls of social media. We can love our neighbors online everyday through social media.
Whether you loath or embrace these changes in technology use in the church, these are just the tip of the iceberg. Technology is advancing pretty fast. Remember, we don’t have to look at it as solely a new way to “reach” the next generation or to stay relevant. If we really think about the ways “loving your neighbor” is changing in this day and age, you might be able to come up with new ways to love with technology. Any ideas?
Some churches have the unfortunate tendency to underestimate how badly they need to hire techs to handle audio, video, lighting, and IT. It seems even more difficult for churches to hire a director. Maybe the pastor has thought about it. Maybe the elders have even debated it. Tight budgets no doubt weigh heavily in these decisions. However, there are five things your church may not be considering when to hire or not to hire is the question:
1. Technical work is harder than you think.
The work of a church tech is very complex. Systems in the digital age are almost always in flux and the state of technology has never been advancing at such an accelerated pace. Many millennials have actually gone to college to study in related fields and have the student loans to prove it. Many baby-boomers boast decades of experience and are committed to staying up to date on leading edge technology. The church presents a unique challenge to technical artists. The delivery of the gospel in a clear way Lastly, demands on technology use to do things such as streaming, simulcast, and archiving require collaborative efforts among multi-disciplinary teams of technical artist to make “simple” concepts a reality. The value of a good technical artist in the for-profit market is to the tune of $45k-85k. Great technical artist are well worth the investment.
2. More time is required than you think.
While church techs are indeed often the first to arrive and the last to leave, when additional tasks or special projects are added to the typical work load, it isn’t uncommon for some tech teams to spend hundreds of man hours a week to complete a project. On top of that also they have to make Sundays happen. Many of those hours is time each tech has to spend away from their family and other obligations. It’s my hope that a more realistic view of time and energy techies commit to projects might prevent usury.
3. Bad tech will hurt growth.
Developing a top notch technical program takes consistency. Every church has a different set of values, objectives, and method. In order to adhere technical systems to the mission of the church, significant thought and planning has go into design and processes that will support the mission and accommodate its growth. When the technology in place does not work for the church, it often can work against the church. When audiences are constantly distracted by constant “technical difficulties”, they will often question the integrity of the leadership.
4. It’s more expensive not to hire.
While volunteers are mostly concerned with making Sunday happen, a paid technical director will partner with church officials to see that the church reaches its objectives. If there is no one to fill this gap, churches will have to spend significant amounts of money hiring consultants to fix what’s not working. They will not necessarily be around to evaluate the effectiveness of their solutions. A good tech team will monitor systems, perform maintenance, and anticipate updates. This often translates to significant savings for your church.
5. If you don’t, someone else will.
Church techies are looking for opportunities. Some are willing to travel or uproot for the right opportunity. Many would LOVE to work for the church that they have been volunteering at. If they receive an opportunity to work elsewhere, I imagine most would strongly consider it. Church leaders, ask yourself. What if your volunteer left your church right before your next service? Could your service go on without a hitch? If not, I strongly suggest you considering hiring a techie.
In my last post I discussed the challenges portable churches can face in getting consistency in setup. These challenges can lead to delays in the services or distractions throughout services. In this post, I will break down how I implemented the 5 tips for getting consistent stage setups that got us back on track.
(Photo Courtesy of Spencers Magic)
Last year I started volunteering as a tech at a portable church that was entering it’s third year. As a young church, it wasn’t a surprise that the previous AV tech on staff was kind of a one man show. When “Joe Solo” left the church, there was a huge void.
The leadership decided it would be best to build a larger volunteer setup team, rather than rely on another solo sound guy. Smart move. The new setup crew was a mix of musicians, singers, and other inexperienced volunteers. Mixing duties were left to a handful of techies with limited experience. Despite having an eager and energetic crew, the setup suffered weekly delays, distractions, disturbances. Service start time fluctuated, and distractions during service were prevalent. I observed how things functioned for a few weeks and when I got the opportunity to implement some changes here is exactly what I did.
The volunteers spent most of the setup time in the morning trying to decode the old solo tech’s setup procedure. The stage was flooded with people scratching their heads. By the time the band came in, the stage wiring was usually a complete mess. The most obvious problem was that the more experienced FOH techs came in later with the band. The techs would often spend valuable time looking for misplaced equipment, re-patching, troubleshooting, and then setting up the FOH station. Not to mention, the worship team still had to do a run through/rehearsal, and the pastor/speaker needed to soundcheck. Despite having 3 hours to get it all done, service started late almost every week. The first change was a simple one. We required the on duty sound tech to come in one hour early with the setup crew. That extra hour for the sound tech ensured a timely and efficient setup from the start and the opportunity for the next tip:
From a volunteer perspective, loading cases on and off the stage is the easy part. When those cases on stage are opened things can get pretty overwhelming very fast. Breaking down the elements of the setup into manageable sizes reduces things into sections that the crew can handle. Instead of each individual focusing on the whole setup ad getting overwhelmed, they can now focus in on doing their part. We determined that our stage could be properly set and wired in 45 mins with 4 people. With the sound tech coming in early with the setup crew of four, we split the setup crew into two pairs. We choose pairs because most of our setup required two people lift and set. The sound tech worked along side both teams. Each pair got a short task list and they performed these tasks every time they came in. Repetition really helped each pair remember each step of what they were assigned. They could check each others work. Hold each other accountable for showing up. Some even carpooled. We tried to always schedule in pairs as much as we could and the result was a streamlined setup.
My biggest fear in my early observations of the inexperienced crew was safety. Fear that the messy stage would result in an injury of a crew member, musician, or pastor. Something had to give. Having the setup crew in pairs allowed the sound tech on duty to float from team to team during setup guiding them with best practices along the way. With a little coaching and a lot of gaft tape, before long, the crews became superstars and could do most tasks unsupervised. Some offered ideas on how we could become even more efficient and safe in our setup. Once more of the crew became more comfortable with the setup, they got more and more interested in other areas like mixing FOH. Giving your team the tools they need to succeed is often the fuel needed to lite the spark that has been squashed by frustration.
When I first landed at the portable church, and as I got to know different folks on the crew, I asked them what they thought were causing the issues and also what they would do to fix it. While I did get a range of answers, it served more as an opportunity to get into the mind of the volunteers who were growing more and more frustrated. Gathering and implementing some of the ideas that were shared was a strategic team building exercise. Including the team members gave them a voice and an opportunity to own the solution. Later on the team could see the progress that they originally envisioned.
The toughest part of transforming the setup was addressing the worship team and church leaders. Because they were not usually present during setup, they often came to varied conclusions as to what was contributing to the difficulties. I observed a lot of mistrust and misplaced blame in my first couple of weeks. When we hit a turning point, I felt that it would be important to gather all the setup crews, sound techs, worship teams, and leaders. The result of the gathering was an opening in communication between the teams. We’ll talk about restoring community and confidence between different teams in the next post.
If you are a portable church, or an established church running a portable setup, you are probably familiar with the challenges that time constraints place on setup. If you are regularly in the trenches, you probably have a six sense of the clock ticking away in your subconscious. I recently volunteered at a portable church that struggled with consistency in setup. As a result, this church experienced a variety of “technical difficulties” during services. Occasionally delays in setup led to delaying the start of service all together. Technical difficulties are often distracting to the audience, worship leaders, and speakers. So how do you combat the tech diff plague? Below are my five tips for getting consistent setups.
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