We are pleased to announce that Con Edison’s choice engine platform – powered by Enervee – has logged over 2.8 million visits, helping New Yorkers make better energy-related buying decisions.
In line with fundamental tenets of NY’s signature policy initiative, Reforming the Energy Vision – most notably, empowering New Yorkers to make more informed energy choices – Con Edison is committed to making markets work better for customers and teamed up with Enervee back in 2016.
The Con Edison Marketplace, Solar Concierge service and Cars choice engine platforms were launched as a successful REV Demonstration Project and have been well received by customers.
Efficient Products
The Con Edison Marketplace was launched to make it simple and compelling for customers to choose the most energy efficient products to meet their needs, currently spanning 24 product categories. Since its launch in 2016, the online platform has hosted more than 2.8 million sessions.
The choice engine platform provides a zero to 100 relative energy efficiency index (the Enervee Score) and personalized energy bill impacts that make it simple and compelling for customers to choose the efficient products they aspire to. Customers have spent more than 60,000 hours on the site. Through the end of 2018 alone, customers made over 220,000 efficient purchases that can be attributed to the platform.
“The Con Edison Marketplace has proven its ability to nudge customers toward energy efficient products – and the majority of the energy savings are achieved without incentives,” said Cristina Coltro, who manages the Marketplace for Con Edison, “It shows that when we make it easier for people to buy energy-saving products, we can get real results.”
An independent assessment of the impact of the Con Edison Marketplace, revealing impressive energy savings, is just wrapping up and will be made public soon.
Genuine Value for Customers
Con Edison has also surveyed customers to pinpoint what makes the Marketplace so appealing.
The Enervee Score, personalized energy bill savings and instant discounts – none of which are available elsewhere – have proven to be among the most helpful features.
Providing this value-added service, while maintaining a commitment to consumer choice, explains why 49.1% of all visitors surveyed had a more favorable opinion of Con Edison as a result of their Marketplace experience.
Customers researching vehicle purchases were even more enthusiastic, as discussed below.
Rooftop & Community Solar
The site also includes a Solar Concierge service that supports customers through the unfamiliar process of procuring rooftop solar — from determining whether solar is right for them, through soliciting comparable bids from contractors and, finally, selecting the best offer. Within Con Edison’s predominantly urban service territory, which includes a large share of multi-family residences, over 40,000 customers got solar estimates for their homes.
Clean Vehicles
Another platform added last year, Con Edison Cars, enables car shoppers to make side-by-side comparisons across conventional gasoline/diesel, hybrid and electric models, including the total cost of ownership (purchase price + personalized operating costs).
Electric vehicles are often the winners, and Con Edison Cars has already attracted over 80,000 visitors and is delivering promising results.
- In over 60% of sessions during which an ICE car model was viewed, visitors also clicked on an EV offer through TRUECar or Tesla
- In the first half of 2019, 84% of clicks to get quotes from local dealers (via TRUECar) or Tesla were for EV models, in a State where the share of EVs in new car sales is still under 2%
- Sixty-two percent of surveyed customers (60% of surveyed customers in the Bronx and Queens) said they were more likely to buy an EV after using the Con Edison Cars platform
- Among people who applied for Con Edison’s $250 EV Reward, 23% were originally considering gasoline or diesel models when they began their car shopping journey and were persuaded to buy an EV.
The site has received positive reviews from users surveyed, such as these results for customers who applied for an EV purchase reward.
The most helpful features mirrored those for the broader palette of consumer products, with some nuances. The ability to compare vehicles across all engine and fuel types side-by-side on aspects that matter most to car shoppers (total cost of ownership, Enervee Score) and having access to accurate information on all available EV incentives and the ability to quickly claim Con Edison’s EV Reward delivered top value from the customer perspective.
Innovation to Benefit Customers and Advance REV Goals
Con Edison has been a great innovation partner for Enervee’s consumer-centric, market-based solutions”, said Matthias Kurwig, Enervee’s CEO. “Con Edison has been our most frequent partner to deploy new customer and back-end solutions coming out of our product roadmap. We are proud of our successful REV demonstration project and excited to transition to full program status, paving the way to scale energy savings and greenhouse gas reductions cost-effectively.”
About Enervee
Enervee provides Choice Engines that empower consumers to choose the energy saving consumer products and clean vehicles they aspire to. We transform energy efficiency and electric vehicle programs by using the Enervee Score to save customers on their energy costs without any incentives required. Enervee partners with innovative electric and gas utilities reaching over 52 million households in the US and Europe.
About Con Edison
Con Edison is a subsidiary of Consolidated Edison, Inc. [NYSE: ED], one of the nation’s largest investor-owned energy companies, with approximately $12 billion in annual revenues and $55 billion in assets. The utility delivers electricity, natural gas and steam to 3.4 million customers in New York City and Westchester County, N.Y. For financial, operations and customer service information, visit conEd.com.
