In 2002, front-loading clothes washers, the most energy efficient, sold twice as well in the Northwest as in the rest of the country. Compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs), still fairly new to the average consumer, flew off the shelves 10 times faster than just two years earlier.

What was going on? Economists, especially ones who pay close attention to how new consumer products find buyers, call it market transformation. And electric co-ops in the four Northwest states—Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana—played an important role.

They were partners in the Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance, more than 140 co-ops, municipal utilities, IOUs, public power districts, government agencies and public interest groups working together to bring affordable energy-efficient products and services to market.

For members of Kootenai Electric Cooperative in Hayden, Idaho, the death rattle of a major appliance was typically followed by a shopping trip to Coeur d’Alene or even across the Washington state line to Spokane. Because of the Alliance they could find information and assistance in the big box stores that applied directly to them.

“Typically, the salesman would come up and ask what utility serves them,” said Larry Bryant, Kootenai’s marketing manager in the summer of 2003. “He would have some literature on hand about energy-efficient [appliances] with our name on it, and he would know that Kootenai is offering a rebate on certain models.”

The Alliance, still going strong today, was a big undertaking. At the time, it had a budget of $20 million and ran more than two-dozen programs for all types and levels of consumers. Bryant, along with Jeff Lewis, member services manager for Salem Electric Co., a co-op in Salem, Oregon, represented the region’s co-ops on the 28-member board of directors.

Bryant had served as chairman in 2002. This was significant because Kootenai Electric and Salem Electric, both with 16,000 consumers, were tiny companies compared to most of the other utilities represented on the board. Bonneville Power Administration, the federal power supplier in the region, had an annual budget that reached into the billions.

Stacey Hobart, the Alliance’s communications manager, explained why it was important to have most of the utilities in the region working together: “We can tell manufacturers that we represent four million consumers in the Northwest,” and they “are likely to listen to us, whereas they might not listen to one lone co-op or even one lone IOU.”

The Alliance focused manufacturers’ marketing efforts in the region, saving them money. And they returned the favor by matching the utilities’ consumer rebates and offering other incentives.

The Alliance’s market impact was stunning. More than one-third of all the washing machines sold in the region in 2002 were high-efficiency front-loading models at a time when many American consumers had never seen one. CFLs became standard products in lighting and hardware stores in just a few years.

Bryant pointed out that the Alliance let the individual utilities get all the credit. Most Kootenai Electric members thought the energy savings, as well as the rebates and other incentives that produced them, were all the co-op’s doing.

“We … know that this gives us a positive image in the eyes of our consumers,” he said.

Teresa Lackey, marketing manager at another Alliance partner, Midstate Electric Cooperative in La Pine, Oregon, said the energy efficiency programs raised the bar for utility customer service throughout the four-state region.

“Our utility probably wouldn’t have done some of these rebates or offered as many programs to our customers if it weren’t for the Alliance.”