[RE-wrenches] quite the conundrum

[Michael Welch]

I'd like to see any discussion of this moved over to the RE-markets list. While it is marginally on topic here since it has to do with your businesses, you will find that there are some non-wrench-member folks on that list that may have some helpful insights.

Marco Mangelsdorf wrote at 11:48 AM 9/8/2011:
 
>In 2008, about 200 Net Energy Metered systems went in on this Big Island of Hawaii, where I live.  About 400 in 2009 and over 800 in 2010.  The same increase in adoption rates took place across the Aloha State.
> 
>I think that the next two years or so will bring a stop to this kind of growth most likely because of the fed grant in lieu of tax credits very likely going away come 1-1-2012 and a likely change to the HI. state tax credits as well after this next legislative session as well as the continued progression of our small island grids becoming more closed to PV due to grid saturation issues.
> 
>Be that as it may, until there’s a contraction in the PV biz in our Aloha State (not a question of if but when), we’re going to continue to be in an insanely competitive sales environment.
> 
>My commercial sales these past 9 months have been kinda light and I’m bothered by that.  Our standard approach is to always offer the highest efficiency mods from Brand X.  But we’ve been losing sales to others who are undercutting us by as much as 30 or more percent.  No surprise, really, since these mods are so much more than pretty much the rest of the market, aside from Brand Y with its HIP and HIT lines.
> 
>I’ve resisted going all in or even mostly in as far as getting container loads of good quality Chinese mods as we’ve been hyping ourselves as providers of the highest efficiency production mods on the planet along with our solid econoline of U.S.-made mods with a minus zero PT and flash test data for every mod.  But if you hit ‘em with Brand X and they’re not really educated on Brand X nor asking for the best, any other quotes that they’re considering from others will make the Brand X quote look way high.  And at that time you can usually kiss the sale good-bye.
> 
>So I’m considering a substantial change in our approach to selling PV.  Go mostly Chinese, go low price to keep up with the competition, offer quotes using Chinese mods as a standard matter of course and perhaps offer Brand X on a more limited basis.  It just seems to me that the commoditization of the PV biz these days has most consumers concluding that price is the most important factor whether the mods come from China, the U.S. or Timbuktu.
> 
>Let the fireworks begin.
> 
>marco