CASE STUDY
Electric Era installs EV fast charging for retail leader
Plaid Pantry 18 months early while saving 75% on demand charge costs
Point of view
Plaid Pantry, a retailer operating 108 c-stores across Washington and Oregon, recognized the critical need to add EV fast charging at their retail locations as well as the challenges associated with delivering it grid constraints, demand charges, 50-70% reliability, and slow time to revenue.
These common factors result in degraded profitability, delayed revenue, and poor customer experience. Jonathan Polonsky, CEO and Chairman of Plaid Pantry, turned to Electric Era to provide solution(s). Electric Era’s PowerNode, a former SpaceX-engineered EV fast charging station, is the only solution to solve key grid integration challenges that increase profitability and deliver 4-month speed to market. Electric Era delivers this alongside industry-leading 98% station reliability for the best customer experience achievable.
Jonathan Polonsky, CEO and chairman of Plaid Pantry
The challenge
Retailers are currently waiting 18 months to activate stations, delaying revenue collection by years – a significant opportunity cost.
Once installed, typical charging stations face incredibly high demand charges from utilities. At Plaid Pantry, a non-PowerNode charging station would incur $12.4k per year in demand charges and $124k over the station’s lifetime.
The
solution
1
Electric Era eliminated the need for grid upgrades at Plaid Pantry, allowing the store to activate the charging station 18 months earlier, while minimizing demand charges.
2
PowerNode enabled Plaid Pantry to immediately collect revenue from EV fast charging and see the associated boost to in-store sales – an estimated $90,000 in total revenue recaptured from early activation.
3
PowerNode is expected to reduce demand charges by $11.4k in Year-1 and $9.1k annually thereafter, a 38% increase to gross margin in year one alone.