Case Study:

Our Client

Our Client is a leading Canadian supplier of energy and energy-related services and products, delivering competitively priced, reliable, and environmentally responsible water and power to the Canadian and U.S. markets. With operations predominantly in Western Canada and the U.S., our Client has created a name for itself in the energy sector. In pursuing aggressive expansion to improve shareholder value, our Client intended to explore opportunities in Ontario.

Our Client’s Need

Our Client Lead is part of an executive team reporting to the Board of Directors on the potential for the company in Ontario. He was tasked with developing a complete view of the competitive landscape including major competitors, market positions and shares, product / service offerings, marketing and sales activities and resources, executive teams and apparent strategies. Without this knowledge, the Client risked making a highly visible and costly move into a market in which it may not be able to compete. At stake were millions of dollars in start up costs, reputational risk, and the threat of an ineffective and slow entry into a highly competitive marketplace.

Our Methodology

We provided insight to our Client in the following areas:

• Worked with our Client to establish the information objectives, the competitors who were of greatest interest, and the types of information that were most needed.
• Established the local market structure and size, and identified emerging trends, opportunities and challenges that would affect our Client’s entry and success in the market.
• Identified the strategies and performance of key market participants.
• Interviewed dozens of industry participants, including analysts, insiders, current and past personnel at competing organizations, customers and other stakeholders to gain a complete understanding of the operations, tactics and strategies of competitors.
• Profiled the competitors, their offerings, market shares, customer acquisition strategies, strengths and weaknesses and opportunities for the client.

What We Delivered to Our Client

Our ability to obtain critical information allowed our Client to clearly understand:

• The competitive landscape and relative positioning of nine direct competitors.
• The current service offerings of the competition as well as market shares, trends and existing market strategies.
• Specific strengths and weaknesses of each competitor.
• Specific marketing and sales approaches that our Client should consider in entering the market.
• Actionable recommendations that enabled our Client to successfully enter the Ontario energy market.

[We] were very pleased with the way Mezzanine researched a number of key issues in the Ontario market. They helped us develop a better view of the opportunities and competitive landscape that existed. We have already recommended them to our partners
Marketing Manager