So the old saying is; wheel goes round and round.

In the OLD Days, only the utility (regulated monopoly) sold power (and distributed it). The utility was not allowed to make a profit on selling power; they could only recover their costs (which were reviewed by the regulators and deemed reasonable).

Deregulation days: energy marketers competed with the utility and each other for supply power to customers. The utility distributed the supplied power. The result: energy marketers were able to reduce customers costs of energy. Illinois’ recently cited 37 billion in savings from energy marketing.

In the 20+ years since deregulation has been rolled out, we are moving back to towards a utility model. In part, because marketing has overtaken the role of education. Most regulators and utilities do not proactively educate their customers in their service options (that is, energy choice is a utility program that is supported by the utility as an option to the utilities’ default service). Therefore, sales tactics or marketing is supposed to educate consumers while selling the service.

Wholesale buying groups, such as COSTCO or BJ, are emerging for energy buying. Wholesale buying club pitch: we don’t profit from energy sales (sound familiar). The fine print: we charge a fixed fee for services. An interesting evolution but confusing all the same. The reason, the use of “wholesale” market is not a uniform description. The term “wholesale” could be used to describe any of 20-100 different energy products and price points. This approach capitalizes on an establish retail sales concept that when applied to energy it appears misleading.  

Energy marketing is a proven method of lowering a customer’s retail energy cost and providing value. The evolution of marketers toward adopting the older utility model is recognition of the maturing of retail marketing. Hopefully, the utilities and regulators see the need for proactive education and not reliance on competitors to education and sell simultaneously.

Realgy Energy Services is a registered Retail Energy Marketer in the states of Illinois, Michigan and Indiana. We offer Service Plans that will provide electric and natural gas at wholesale pricing direct to customers without any utility markup. Our Service Plans work with the local utility to provide seamless service and annual energy savings. Service Plans include Guaranteed SavingsTM, ManagedPriceTM, ManagedGreenTM Index, Fixed and PriceAssuranceTM.

Additional Information:

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