A football stadium under floodlights is one of the brightest environments a cheer squad ever performs in, which is why metallic and holographic poms look spectacular there and disappointing almost everywhere else. Floodlights put enormous amounts of light onto the field for reflective material to bounce back. Move the same poms into a darkened gym, an arena blackout or the late innings of a ball game and there is nothing left to reflect. The equipment did not change — the light did.
Why reflective poms look so good on a Friday night
Stadium floodlighting is designed around one requirement: making a large outdoor field bright enough for players, officials and broadcast cameras. That means a great deal of light, aimed down at the playing surface from high mounting positions on all sides.
A metallic mylar pom is a mirror cut into strips. Put it in that much light and every strip catches and throws a hard specular flash as it moves. The effect is genuinely brilliant, and it is why metallic poms became the standard — they were designed for exactly this venue.
The important thing to understand is where that brightness comes from. It is not coming from the pom. It is coming from the stadium. The pom is borrowing it.
The four places that borrowed light runs out
- A gym with the house lights down. Almost every basketball programme kills the lights for starting lineups and halftime. Reflective poms go dark at the exact moment every phone in the building starts recording.
- An arena blackout. Hockey and many basketball arenas run a full blackout with spotlights on the ice or floor. Performers are usually positioned outside that spotlight, in the dimmest part of the building.
- The late innings. Baseball and softball games start in daylight and end in darkness, with field lighting aimed at the diamond rather than the stands or the foul lines.
- A blackout or glow themed night. The irony of the most popular student section theme: you ask a whole stadium to wear the one colour that stops existing after dark, then drop the lights.
Floodlights work against you too
There is a second effect worth knowing about, and it is the one that frustrates squads who buy light-up equipment and first try it at a football game.
Anything that produces its own light is competing against the floodlights. Under full stadium lighting a lit pom still reads as a strongly coloured pom, and it will photograph in your team colour rather than in generic silver — but the glow is not dramatic, because the ambient light is overwhelming it. People sometimes conclude the product is weak when what they have actually done is test it in the one environment where emitted light has the least advantage.
Take the same poms into a dark gym and the comparison inverts completely. The reflective set disappears; the lit set is the only thing visible in the room.
What this means for buying
- If your season is almost entirely outdoor day and floodlit games: metallic poms are the right call, and they are cheaper. Buy them in your team colours.
- If your season includes a gym, an arena, theme nights or anything after dark: you need something that emits light, because reflective material has nothing to work with for a meaningful part of your year.
- If you perform in both — which is most programmes, football into basketball into competition — the question is which half of your calendar you want to equip for.
We would rather tell you this plainly than sell a squad light-up poms for a schedule of daytime football games. The product is at its best in the dark, and that is exactly where most of the winter calendar happens.
Made by Neon Cowboys®
Light-Up LED Pom Poms
- They make their own light — the brightness does not come from the venue
- Your team colours under floodlights, a full glow once the lights go down
- Remote colour-changing across the whole squad
- Made to order
See also: glow in the dark vs blacklight vs LED, iridescent and holographic poms vs LED and student section themes and blackout nights.
Questions: info@neoncowboys.com.
