Written by Mike Graham, product manager for CHAUVET Professional

My name is Michael Graham and I have tried broccoli for the first time ever this week. I ended up liking it.

For the past 37 years I have avoided it like it was some kind of evil stalk of green nastiness on my plate. I have been watching my son actually ask for it for dinner. He’s 5 and at that age, aren’t kids supposed to not want veggies? So I convinced myself to try it. We had ordered take out one night and in there was some chicken with broccoli. While I was dishing everyone’s out, I psyched myself up and ate some. All in all, not bad. You all should have seen the look on my wife’s face.  She has been trying for the past 10 years to get me to eat more veggies.

How does this relate to lighting?, you may ask. Well, oddly enough, I think that we often feel the same way about new lighting products or ideas. We get it into our heads that there is only one way to design a show and we have our favorite lights that we like to do it with.  We get into a rut and forget that there is more than one way to skin a cat. It is important to take that first bite of broccoli and try new stuff. We as an industry are so lucky to have as many new products as we do. Year after year.

Look around at what else is going on out there. When is the last time you said, “Wow, that pencil sharpener industry is really evolving.” It is critical for us all on both sides of this blog to try new stuff and not get stuck in the same old same old.

So, come on, try something new. You might be surprised at how cool it is.

P.S. We are launching some really cool new pencil sharpeners at InfoComm this week.  Come by, I would love to show you how they work.