With its California power marketing arrangement with Enron nowhistory, Amway Corp. has hooked up with Columbia Energy, asubsidiary of Columbia Energy Group, to market gas and electricityto residential and small business users, first in Georgia and thennationwide.

Amway distributors will be able to sign consumers up withColumbia Energy’s gas service. Electricity and other energyproducts and services will be added to the program as deregulationpermits. Over time, the two companies plan to expand the program ona state-by-state basis, until it is offered coast-to-coast.

Recently, the Georgia Public Service Commission certifiedColumbia to sell gas at decontrolled prices to residential andsmall commercial customers. In Georgia, the Columbia-Amway alliancewill compete with 18 other marketers for 1.4 million customers, oneof the largest markets yet to open to competition.

Amway representatives will approach their existing customers andencourage them to call Columbia to inquire about energy savingsthat could be as much as 15%. It will be up to Columbia to quoteprices to the prospects as prices vary across the Atlanta Gas Lightservice territory.

Mark Talbot, a senior marketer with Amway, said he does notthink Amway-Columbia will be at a disadvantage by not being able toquote prices immediately to customers. Instead, he sees thearrangement capitalizing on the already established customerrelationships Amway representatives have. He said he did not knowhow many customers that is because each Amway representative keepshis own customer list. Amway had a similar arrangement to sellEnron’s electricity to California customers. Enron later pulled outof the California market.

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