According to the DOE’s Energy Star website: Replacing old windows with Energy Star–qualified windows lowers household energy bills by 7% to 15%. (See here.)
So by installing the most energy-efficient windows; sealing ducts, cracks, and around all openings; and by adding insulation to walls, the attic, and the crawlspace floor, homeowners may reduce energy consumption and the cost of energy consumed by between 20% and 35%. When the Home Star bill looked as if it would pass, a 20% reduction in energy use was the threshold that qualified for the most substantial tax rebates offered, and had to be proved by test-in/test-out procedures carried out by a certified technician.
If 20% to 30% energy savings from a complete energy retrofit doesn’t impress your prospect, or you’re competing with a firm claiming 40% to 50% reductions just from installing its windows, note that you can back up any number you use with scientific documentation — such as data from the DOE or Energy Star websites. That will make more extravagant claims sound like a lot of hot air to your prospect.
“Anytime you’re seeing a number approaching 30% or 50%, those are unsubstantiated claims and can’t be proven,” says D.S. Berenson, of Johanson Berenson LLP, a Washington-area law firm. Berenson, well-known for representing home improvement companies, urges contractors claiming energy savings to have hard data on hand to substantiate those claims, or to promote their products and services using more general claims that are beyond dispute.
So what could you say in your advertising or in the home that’s not deceptive? Something neutral, generic, and non-specific. For instance: “Installing our windows and doors lowers your energy bills and saves you money.” The reason that’s the safer way to go, Berenson says, is that “it’s hard for an attorney general to argue against the idea that if you put in windows and doors that are energy efficient, that all else being equal, it’s going to save [the homeowner] money.”
AUDIT VS. ANALYSIS Say your company decides to sell energy upgrades — air sealing, insulation, attic barrier, etc. You’ll need some kind of inspection process to determine which upgrades are appropriate and necessary. That could mean an energy audit, or it could mean something less comprehensive but ultimately just as effective, which companies typically choose to call an energy analysis or assessment. The distinction is not just semantic. An audit is now understood by professionals and even savvy homeowners to mean a measurable test of the house conducted by a trained, certified, professional, which results in a report recommending solutions discovered in the testing phase, with testing at a later point to determine the effectiveness of the retrofit in reducing energy consumption. “Do not use the term ‘audit’ unless you’re using a technician certified by BPI, RESNET, or someone similar,” Berenson advises. “And if you’re not doing a blower door test, I don’t think it’s an audit.”
Because many contractors have played fast and loose with all these terms, calling what you do an “audit” when it doesn’t involve either a certified technician or a blower door test could bring about consumer complaints and an investigation.
An analysis or assessment, which is what many home improvement companies offer, pinpoints specific opportunities to reduce energy consumption and recommends solutions. It’s also something a company representative can do fairly quickly, meaning that an energy retrofit can be sold on the first visit. An energy audit, on the other hand, takes several hours. An audit is typically used by home performance companies, which specialize in prescribing and installing energy upgrades, as a loss leader, to be absorbed in the price of the job that’s likely to result from the recommendations and report. In such cases, an energy audit is really the first call in a two-call selling process.
Co-owner Harless says that eShield of Virginia, which expects to sell somewhere between $4 million and $4.5 million worth of energy retrofits this year, uses a 15-point checklist and a infrared gun to measure hot and cold areas in the house. The company’s sales rep goes through the home’s attic as well as its living spaces. Seven out of 10 attics, he says, lack sufficient insulation. “We make it absolutely clear that we are not doing an energy audit,”
Harless says. “It is an energy assessment or analysis based on our knowledge of air infiltration into the building.” Harless adds that he initially tried selling energy projects using his existing salesforce. But he quickly decided that he needed a separate group since the average sale for home improvement products, such as windows or a sunroom, was much greater than an energy retrofit/home performance job, and the existing salesforce “didn’t want to sell a lower ticket.”
“So we opened a separate division,” Harless says, “hired a new sales manager and new salespeople, and created separate marketing.” It worked.
