CNN Money - Saving on Energy

Here is a video I found on CNN Money.  You will need to save it to your computer somwhere, then choose RealPlayer to play it. 

I think the most important part is towards the end where they talk about heating your water.  What I DON’T find acceptable, is they talk about adding insulation to your water tank (good idea)… but fail to mention the newer tankless on-demand water heaters (either oil or gas)… which are real money savers.

I would appreciate feedback from anyone concerning the actual download of the video.  This was my first experiment with the blog uploading a video.  ( I actually downloaded to my pc, using the download feature from Realplayer)  the original video is still on CNN MONEY videos.

Here is a link to what I think is an excellent article on heating oil…

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26222711/

Much is discussed about market volatility and pre-buys.  (which we still have some gallons available as I type this)

It is no secret that we sell and install all sorts of heating,cooling and indoor air quality equipment.  I am sure many of you reading this see our vans,trucks,signs or other promotional material that say “Heating & Cooling Installations”.  Or you may have received a direct mail flyer that we did in a Valpak mailing or such, talking about one of the new modern marvels of the heating world we sell.  Heck, I have a page right on this website that talks about this stuff. (soon to be expanded further)  

I think executives and marketers in this business have been getting it all wrong!  (including myself)  We always talk or write about how great this stuff is, and how much we can save customers on fuel costs… and the likes such as that… But instead of telling  customers how great this new stuff is, we as marketers need to show  customers this.  Doesn’t the old saying go… “You can talk the talk, but can you walk the walk?”

Well I can “walk” all of you through this.  In the fall of 06, I had our guys completely remove my old heating & cooling system and install a brand new one. Before I tell you what I installed.. here is some foreground info… I purchased my new home in February of 06. With my new ranch home came a 20 or so year old Sears Special Furnace/Central a/c system with an electric water heater. Every time the burner went off in the winter, it sounded like a Peterbuilt truck was driving thru my living room!. (not kidding)  That first summer in my new house my July and August electric bills were $235 and $258.  Now i am a single guy and my house is only 1200 square feet so it didn’t take me long to realize it was time for change!  Hence the change was made before that next heating season.

I had my guys replace everything.  The furnace was replaced with a Viessman boiler and we turned a standard forced hot air system into a hydro-air system.  We junked the electric water heater and replaced with a Super-Stor stainless steel indirect water heater.  The old central a/c condensor (if you can call it that) was replaced with a 13 seer Thermopride unit and it was connected to a first co air handler.  We put in 2 indoor air quality products, an American Standard electronic air cleaner and a AprilAir central humidifier.  I also replaced the old oil tank with a Roth double-walled oil tank. 

So the results… (or the “walk”)  Even after electric rates went up 30% or so since 06′ My electric bill I just paid 2 days ago (the inspiration for this post) was $147.   So I did some research thru ALL of my electric bills since my install was done and ALL of them were lower (at least from the availble comps I had with the old system)  Most of them significantly lower.   Now I haven’t changed my habits at all… I still like my house cold… so please trust me when I say the comps are real.

So you might ask about the oil consumption!  Well I can tell you this… My tank was just filled.  I am completely full as I type this!  Since October 8th of 2007, I have put in a grand total of 493 gallons in my 1200 square foot house.  (remember that I use for heat and hot water now too) And as much as i like my house cool in the summer, I like it warmer in the winter!  So don’t think i am stingy when it comes to my oil.. All I will say is “this stuff works” 

Funny thing now is, if I were to do the same type of conversion today, I would have gone a cheaper route(from an installation cost standpoint) and save even more money!  ( If it were the same circumstances, I wold have replaced the old furnace with a Thermopride furnace and installed one of the new Toyotomi on-demand oil fired water heaters (those things rock)… All of the other components would remain the same) 

So anyone reading this, please visit your local heating & a/c guy (please give us a try if you are in our area… shameless promo I know… us marketing guys :)  ) The new equipment out there really is phenomenal.  You will save lots of money in the long haul, and increase the value of your home in the process!  And with today’s financing options available for equipment, you very well might improve your monthly cash flow.

Howdy All,

One of the advantages of my placing my office in the front portion of our Westfield office, is that I often get to hear customer comments and/or questions that stop in the office.  When customers stop in, my ears often “open up” and I like to listen to what they have to say, and more importantly how my staff responds to their needs.

This post is inspired by a situation that happened today.  This afternoon, a customer stopped in and was inquiring about why she received a delivery.  She was an auto delivery client on our budget program.   The customer thought that we were trying to make more money from her, because the prices over the last week have fallen, and this customer thought we were trying to “squeeze” a delivery in before the prices went down any further.   I have heard this (erroneous) theory from people before, so I am going to try and put this to rest in a public setting.

Prices have absolutely no bearing on when we make a delivery.   I actually mention this briefly in the website text.  We keep the same margins no matter what the price does.  When wholesale prices go up, our daily posted price goes up… When wholesale prices go down, our daily price goes down.  However, our delivery schedule remains constant.  We deliver using the industry standard degree day system.  (eventually,  I am going to post exactly what that all means)  

The quick synopsis of when  auto-clients get a delivery goes like this.  Every auto-del customer has a next degree day delivery date.   (this gets determined by several factors, I will explain in further detail in a future post)  The next degree day (which is printed on every ticket by the way) is the most important number that determines when a customer gets a delivery.  We have a degree day computer in the office, which constantly updates based on the weather… The heat and heat/hot water numbers on that computer are entered into the main scheduling software on a daily basis.  (today’s numbers were 6163/7104)  We print auto tickets every day (less in the summer months)… pulling ahead slightly based on the degree days.  ( I just looked at our computer and our last pulls were 6092/7200.  Which actually means we are behind slightly in the Heat Only category…but considering it is 90 degrees outside, the Heat only side isn’t as critical right now)…   We pull ahead slightly because tickets have to go thru credit review, then go into the delivery schedule for the upcoming days.. (since we are not in the same areas all the time).   In the winter, we may pull 300 degree days ahead, because so many degree days accumulate per day, and that is required to get an accurate delivery schedule… The last thing we want to do is run a customer out of oil.  So there it is.. the very brief overview of how we determine delivery dates… (It is actually much more involved, but this is a blog.. and not a thesis)

So now that you know how we deliver, you can see why customer x theory above is just blatently absurd.  If a) we were trying to make more money, why would we even lower prices? b)If we knew exactly what oil prices were going to do on any given day, why wouldn’t we just invest in oil commodities and not even bother delivering to people!  We would be gazillionaires…which is not even a word, I know, but the point remains the same… if we had a crystal ball and knew exaclty what the prices were going to do, we really would be wealthy people.  There is no crystal ball!  There is a reason the word speculation is in the oil market, a word you hear all the time.  NO ONE can tell you exaclty what the oil market is going to do on any given day.  All you can do is make a guesstimate!  c) I couldn’t even imagine how to devise such a scheme, especially with the amount of auto customers we service (about 3,500).  The amount of time and man hours we would have to spend going thru all those accounts, and innefficiencies associated with such a delivery scheme.. would certainly negate the few pennies per gallon you might make d) The whole theory just sounds wrong and unethical.  There is a reason we have the BBB seal showing on our website! 

Now I am NOT calling our customer(s) stupid,idiot(s),clueless or anything else bad. Please don’t misinterprate what I am trying to say here.  I like our customers.  I really want to get to know them better. I know without them I wouldn’t have a job, so it is certainly in my and my families best interest to listen to their needs and help them as best  we can!  That was a big reason I started this blog. I really wanted a good medium to meet people and to try to educate them about us.  However, I have noticed that since energy prices have climbed so much, many people are in panic mode, many are scared and are genuinly worried about how they are going to provide for their families!   I can’t tell you what the future will bring, but I can tell you that we will be here to help you with whatever gets thrown at us all.