Scana Energy Marketing, one of only five marketers making thecut for the opening of the Georgia natural gas market Nov. 1, isclaiming the lion’s share of the 16,000 total customers signed upby the Oct. 26 deadline for initial deliveries.

Scana, along with Georgia Natural Gas Services, Infinite Energy,Peach Tree Natural Gas, and E Prime Inc. opted to pursue customersfor the initial deliveries in Atlanta Gas Light’s territory, whilethe other 14 marketers authorized to participate by the GeorgiaPublic Service Commission (GPSC) remained on the sidelines.

According to Randy Michaels, from Scana, over 90% of thecommercial and residential customers who switched chose Scana. Georgia Natural Gas, the AGL affiliate, boasted of its performanceas well. “Both the total number of switching customers, and thenumber of customers who joined our company vastly exceeded ourexpectations.” spokesman Clifford Payne said.

GPSC spokesman Shawn Davis attributed the weak marketerparticipation to operational difficulties between AGL and themarketers. “I expect all of the marketers to aggressively advertiseto customers,” Davis said, “Most just anticipated glitches in thesystem and scheduled their promotional efforts with that in mind.”

With AGL announcing that the operational problems should besolved in early November, Davis believes many of the othermarketers will begin advertising in the next couple of weeks.

Scana’s Michaels, however, said many marketers were caughtunprepared, “Its like a kid trying to cram for an exam goingagainst a kid who’s been studying all along. They just did not putin the research time and money that we did.” Payne concurred,saying Georgia Natural Gas was able to succeed due to itspreparedness, while other companies employed strategies that “leftthem at the gate.”.

With the bulk of AGL’s 1.4 million customers still available,plenty of opportunities remain. One chance for a marketer to makeup ground is to sign up to supply the 30,000 customers in the poolrepresented by aggregator Grassroots Energy. As of Tuesday,Grassroots, the only aggregator formally entered in the Georgiamarket, remained unsigned. Davis said he expects as the marketdevelops, aggregators will provide a healthy alternative forresidents, and therefore have a larger effect on marketers’ tacticsand opportunities.

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