March 6, 2002—While utilities and energy providers offer their customers dozens of different ancillary products and services, only a handful are successful on a widespread basis, leading industry researcher Chartwell Inc. reports in its new study of seventy-plus energy companies’ ancillary products and services offerings and the competitive strategies behind those efforts.
Today’s hottest ancillary offerings aimed and commercial or industrial customers help them manage energy usage or load, ultimately controlling costs—a goal of almost every large end-use customer. Products and services filling this need include load management programs, energy management consulting, and usage audits. In addition, Chartwell found that utilities also have been launching power quality programs that may include surge protection, onsite power, and/or power quality monitoring.
The most popular residential offerings are financial services/insurance products and services, including appliance or HVAC financing, bill-payment insurance, appliance/HVAC and electrical wiring warrantees or insurance, and budget billing or flat monthly rates, the firm’s research discovered. This category of products/services wins the popularity and profitability contests, topping the charts for “most profitable” and “most popular among customers” as well as the most commonly launched over the past twelve months.
For more information, contact Chartwell at 800/432.5879.
