Now that it’s been a few years since the dreaded takeover by Chinese consortium MLS, I wanted to quickly hop on the forum and ask: where has this iconic lighting brand wound up? All USA factories have closed, a sharp decrease of quality and selection, etc. Where are Sylvania bulbs in hardware stores? Everywhere you look you see GE and Feit, but no Sylvania!

Where is LEDVANCE taking this company? I mean, even the Versailles, KY DISTRIBUTION center was shuttered! Are they planning on halting the export of Sylvania-branded products altogether?

The only place to find their A19s are on Amazon, eBay, and other lighting distributors, whereas before, you’d find them on shelves all around: Walmart, BJs, you name it!

Anyone here know about what’s going on? Is this the end of an era? 

Yep, the current owner pretty much ran the brand into the ground. Unless GTE is written on a Sylvania package I’m not buying it.

I agree with the statement on GTE.

To be quite honest, I’m angrier at Osram more than the Chinese consortium that bought out the household Sylvania division.

OSRAM just “felt” like carving off the company; they knew perfectly well what they were doing- absolutely annihilating the name ‘Sylvania’ as we know it. Screw them.

Even the packaging of GTE vs OSRAM vs LEDVANCE Sylvania shows- GTE always had eye-popping, creative, and to the point packaging, whilst Osram and Sylvania liked to run in circles and print little ‘fun fact’ bubbles such as “lasts 8273737228 years!” rather than focusing on a quality product INSIDE of the box.

Speaking of GTE, what happened to the people/company behind the corporation? From what I understand they merged with another entity to make Verizon?

Same thing happened with Philips, rebranded as 'Signify' although I don't think it's actually Chinese-owned, not that I'd be surprised if it were 

Philips was a world-renowhed name, why change it to something so inane..? 

The same thing happened to GE too. GE Lighting got split up into two separate entities, the residential line got bought by Savant, a smart home/IOT device manufacturer and the commercial line got bought by Daintree and renamed GE Current. Well it seems recently GE current has been renamed to Current and the GE logo removed from their website.

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As for Sylvania. GTE (General Telephone and Electronics) sold off Sylvania to Osram during the 90s in order to focus more on their core business of telecom. The Osram era seemed to be ok at first but they pretty much let the Sylvania name die by selling it off to LEDvance. I noticed Sylvania products are getting harder to find now. Lowe's and Rona switched from Sylvania to GE and Feit. Canadian Tire and Home Hardware switched from Sylvania to Philips. In the case of Canadian Tire they started selling more of their store brand instead.

What's left are the grocery stores which still seem to sell Sylvania for whatever reason.

So, what’s to come? A completely nonexistent brand in the states?

I remember when Sylvania products were all the stores had on the shelves… (save some GE and Phillips), now the tables have turned entirely…

Is this the end of an era? 

Yes...no one except us cares about lighting anymore. This is happening everywhere...no pride, no quality. Everything is rapidly turning into junk. I could go on, but I'd probably be banned for being political and saying that a certain country is taking over the world...not by armies, but by technology, and capital.

@ Rommie: As far as I know, Philips has no connection to Signify...all the major manufactures spun-off their lighting businesses due to low profit margins and didn't want it to drag down their stock value.

Yeah, I noticed the consolidation of lighting especially in the consumer market to coming from more or less a single country after the transition to LED. Fluorescent, HID, and incandescent to a extent were manufactured locally. I suppose luminaires for the commerical and utility sector are still manufactured locally but the components are probably all imported regardless.

And you hit the nail on the head about no one caring about quality. Gone are the days when luminaires were built to last and were designed to be serviceable. Instead the cheap stuff is now all manufacturered e-waste that starts to fail after a year.

 Menards still sells a full line of "Sylvania" lighting products !

Yes...no one except us cares about lighting anymore.

What sadness. I remember (albeit being a young boy) when new installations had style; you’d look up and see a variety of different bulbs, reflectors, refractors, etc. Every fixture was crafted for longevity and serviceability in mind- I mean I have fixtures in my town lighting since the early 60s!!!

Now it’s mass-produced, thoughtless, characterless, government-subsidized garbage.

Fixtures are only being “designed” to fail; there is no character in the garbage they are currently producing; everything has integrated, proprietary boards that are purposely designed to fail just after the warranty period ends.

Oh and don’t get me started on the outsourcing of manufacturing… 

Link? I don’t have Menards locations near me, so I wouldn’t know. Is it possible to ship products to your door?

https://www.menards.com/main/search.html?search=lightbulbs&sf_categoryHierarchy=Electrical_6290&brandName_facet=Sylvania&skipKeywordInCategory=true  They also have Sylvania HID (small selection) and fluorescent !

Cool, thanks!

Are HID bulbs under LEDVANCE Sylvania any good??

 Never tried them .

Cool, thanks!

Are HID bulbs under LEDVANCE Sylvania any good??

Heck no! Utter rubbish...if I find a luminaire with one, it goes immediately into the trash.