Ethical Electric, the energy startup that placed first in its sector of the
D.C. Regional Challenge Cup, is looking for a chief marketing officer and is kicking off a series A fundraising round. The company, which is a certified B-corporation, was founded in 2011 by Tom Matzzie and has since grown to include 14 full-time staff members.
Richard Graves, Ethical Electric's VP of business development, says the company began building its team in fall 2012 and marketing its service in February.
Ethical Electric supplies local clean energy to consumers who have a choice in their energy suppliers. Fourteen states, including Maryland and D.C. locally, have opened the market for alternative energy sources. Graves says that most of Ethical Electric's power comes from wind farms in Pennsylvania.
On average, customers who choose Ethical Electric over traditional energy suppliers pay between $6 and $8 more per month. "It's a small premium," Graves says, "but less than what people were paying two years ago. Our customers are surprised. They think it would be more expensive." The company also donates one percent of its fees to causes that support positive environmental change.
One of the biggest draws for customers, explains Graves, is the advanced technology the company uses to make switching energy suppliers "as easy as signing up for Twitter. It is a two-step process," he says.
Though he won't yet divulge the details of the series A round, Graves says that two trends are emerging that are "interesting" and are most likely interesting to potential investors as well. First, "a lot of people haven't realized that they have a choice" in their energy source. Now services like Ethical Electric are helping those consumers understand their choices, "and clean energy just keeps growing."
Second, "typical energy providers don't provide a great web experience," Graves continues. Bills can be hard to read and difficult to interpret. Ethical Electric wants to provide a great web experience. "We're a new kind of power company," he says. "We want to change the way people relate to energy."