Digital marketing firm, Unframed Digital, has published a 2026 report, Transparency Wins The Spec: How Product Brands Build Designer Trust Online. The report is based on a survey of 783 U.S. design professionals. Key survey findings include:
- 98 to 99% of design professionals shop for products online.
- 54% discover products through organic search.
- 59% say it is hard to trust product quality online.
- 51% say pricing is not transparent.
- 68% evaluate 10 or fewer products before making a purchase.
- 64% want product specs before contacting sales.
- 38% say downloadable Revit families and 3D files are the most helpful website feature.
Transparency is becoming one of the most important drivers in product specification, and it is reshaping how lighting and building products earn trust in the marketplace. For manufacturers, the message is clear: if you want to win the spec, you need to make it easier for designers, engineers, and owners to understand exactly what they are buying.
For years, technical claims were often buried in inconsistent submittals, vague marketing language, or hard-to-compare documentation. That approach is no longer enough. Specifiers now expect straightforward performance data, better disclosure of materials and sourcing, and clearer evidence that products will perform as promised over time.
This shift is not just about ethics or branding. It is about reducing risk. When a product’s data is transparent, the specifier can compare it with confidence, the contractor can install it with fewer surprises, and the owner can evaluate long-term value more accurately. In a market where projects are increasingly judged on lifecycle cost, maintainability, and compliance, transparency has become a competitive advantage.
One reason transparency matters so much is that building teams are under pressure from multiple directions. Energy codes, sustainability targets, health and wellness goals, and procurement requirements all raise the bar for documentation. A product that is technically strong but difficult to evaluate may lose out to a competitor that is easier to verify.
That is especially true in lighting, where specifiers must weigh efficacy, controllability, color quality, glare control, and application fit. If a product’s claims are easy to test against published data, it earns credibility. If the information is incomplete or hard to interpret, even a good product can fall out of consideration.
Transparency also supports better collaboration across the project team. Architects, lighting designers, engineers, distributors, and contractors all work from the same information when documentation is clear. That can shorten review cycles, reduce revision requests, and make the purchasing decision less dependent on salesmanship and more dependent on performance.
Manufacturers that want to stay competitive should treat transparency as part of product development, not as an afterthought. That means publishing consistent data sheets, providing third-party test results when available, clarifying assumptions behind claims, and making submittals easier to compare. It also means anticipating the questions specifiers will ask before they have to ask them.
The broader lesson is simple: the spec market is rewarding products that are easier to trust. Transparency does not replace innovation, price, or design quality, but it increasingly determines whether those strengths are noticed at all. In that sense, transparency is not just winning attention. It is winning the spec.
The Unframed Digital report can be downloaded here.
All images courtesy of Unframed Digital.
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