Garrett Harper, with Clean Cut Lawn & Landscaping Inc., background at left, checks the bulbs on a string of tree lights at a home in the Deerfield neighborhood Tuesday. Even with a slumping economy, a lot of people still choose to decorate with outdoor lighting displays for the holiday season.

Holiday lights are still brightening the nights around Lawrence, but there are a few more dark spots in some neighborhoods.

Some companies that set up outdoor Christmas decorations have found that more customers have decided not to flip on the power.

“We had a lot of interest from businesses in previous years and we just haven’t been able to get that kind of interest this year,” said Garrett Harper, owner of Clean Cut Lawn & Landscape in Lawrence. “The residential (business) hasn’t changed that much but the commercial end has changed quite a bit.”

All-N-1 Landscape, with customers in the Lawrence-Topeka area, found that half of its clients didn’t renew their contracts this year, co-owner Dmitriy Denisenko said. The business handles only residential customers.

“There were quite a few new customers we picked up, but that was only about half of what we picked up last year,” Denisenko said.

Most repeat customers who didn’t renew said they were doing so to save money, Denisenko said.

But at least two Lawrence hardware stores are not noticing any decline in outdoor light sales, managers said.

“As far as the lighting, no, but maybe some other decorations might be a little bit off, nothing significant” said Paul Groundwater, manager at Westlake Ace Hardware, 711 W. 23rd St.

The situation was similar at the Westlake store at 601 Kasold Drive, manager Scott Schmille said.

Electricity usage in Lawrence is about the same this year as it was last year at this time, a spokeswoman with Westar Energy said.

Customers, perhaps weary of high energy costs, are taking other steps to cut expenses, hardware store managers and outdoor decorators noticed. They are buying LED lights instead of incandescents.

“It’s been a trend the last couple of years and it’s continuing, that more people are switching to LED lights because they are more efficient and don’t cost as much to run,” Groundwater said.

LEDs are more expensive to purchase but they pay for themselves over the course of two or three years, Schmille said.