Natural Gas Marketer Trend to Boost Profitability
Thank you to my regular readers who have supplied pointed feedback about their areas of interest … I welcome such inputs, not only to steer my writing, but also for the inspiration they provide. The pattern of interest has centered squarely on wanting to hear about the experiences of Natural Gas Marketers and LDCs, related to:
- Business challenges and how they are being addressed
- Trends we are witnessing
- New nGenue implementations – where, why and resultant impact
In this installment, I will knock off the first two bullets by sharing with you a new trend that has emerged in 2021, along with what these businesses have told us that makes this trend one that is likely to continue for the foreseeable future. We have all heard the expression, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.” Did you know these so familiar words are attributed to Joseph P. Kennedy, father of former President, John F. Kennedy? In the context of enduring a tough 2020, we have been engaged by several Marketers and LDCs who “got going” by taking stock of their operations and prioritizing key aspects of their business needing to change. In particular, a trend that has emerged over the last few months pertains to Marketers who have historically relied on external service providers for aspects such as scheduling coming forward after reaching the decision, “No more! We are bringing this work in-house.”
Another well-known expression is, “Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning”, attributed to William Arthur Ward. At nGenue, we are always seeking to understand motivations behind the business decisions that lead to our engagement, especially when several companies come forward in a relatively short time span with pretty much the same objective. Here are some sound bites shared with us, pointing to what is behind this new trend towards scheduling self-management:
- We’ve been lacking data transparency and have come to realize we need to better understand what’s going on.
- Not having fingertip access to our scheduling data is weird when we have this for our other data.
- We either can’t remember the reason we outsourced this work, or the reason has since become invalid.
- We’ve been at the mercy of the service provider who clearly has their, not our, best interests in mind.
- Being that we are in competition with our service provider further squeezes our margins.
- Using a service provider prevents us from leveraging storage to our financial benefit.
- We’re seeking to reduce our cost of supply and our administration process.
- Our objective is growth, and our service provider is an obstacle to growth – plain and simple.
While the above statements were made specifically for scheduling, the concepts of fingertip data accessibility, data transparency, and increased control over business financial impact are in no way unique to the scheduling arena. Rather, these concepts are equally applicable to forecasting, billing, and EDI. Can you relate to any of the above bullets for your business?
I would like to think my previous writings motivated these Marketers to reach out to us, although JPK’s expression is the more likely trigger. 2020 was a tough year for many, making 2021 the opportunity to distance oneself from the issues of 2020, accelerating growth and profitability. Bringing externally managed operational aspects in-house increases your control and can have a favorable impact on your financial performance, especially for the likes of scheduling, which may be readily managed efficiently in the hands of a relatively few headcount. If you have not given consideration to this for your natural gas business, there’s no time like the present to do so, especially when affordable, purpose-built for natural gas Pricing, Billing, Customer Management, ETRM, Scheduling, and LDC Transaction Management software is readily available.
Whether large or small, Marketers, Producers, LDCs, Utilities, and Pipelines face increasing competitive and compliance pressures, requiring increased operational efficiency, data integrity and process improvement. Their operational systems must support this, but most do not. Engage us and we will show you how to make an affordable breakthrough. It’s what we do for natural gas companies, and we are experts in our field. nGenue enables competitive advantage.
– Ken
