ECube’s Technology Lowers The Energy Consumption In A Restaurants Refrigeration System

Helping restaurants lower their energy in the kitchen, ECube shows off their latest technology at the National Restaurant Association Conference in Chicago.

Full Transcription:

Ben Lack: Well, we’re here with Cardi Saunders and Raj Patel from eCube. Thanks so much for giving us some of your time. Start off by telling us what eCube is.

Cardie Saunders: Well, eCube is simply an energy-saving device for commercial refrigeration. Works with all commercial refrigerators, reach-ins walk-ins, any size, any make. And quite simply, it meaures the temperature of food rather than air. And by doing that, it makes the refrigerator operate in a different format. So kind of forecasting what’s going to happen. It actually does what it’s supposed to do which is measure the temperature of food. That creates longer cycles and longer cycles makes longer life for the compressor, more savings, energy savings, and, of course, carbon dioxide.

Ben Lack: So what’s going to separate you guys from your competition?

Raj Patel: Well, that’s the neat thing about eCube is that there is no competition. There is no other product like it. It’s a unique solution for a niche market, and we’re the only ones making it.

Ben Lack: And you guys are really trying to focus more to the restaurant sector? Is that why you guys are here at the show?

Cardie Saunders: We focused on hospitality. It’s kind of our primary. And even within that, restaurants tend to have a lot of inefficient equipment, older equipment. There aren’t as many sophisticated systems. They really benefit from us even more. Our average energy saving is twenty percent, but in the restaurant business, you tend to see it towards the higher end in upwards of 30%.

Ben Lack: And how long have you been in the business trying to perfect the product?

Cardie Saunders: We’ve been involved since 2007.

Ben Lack: Is the product patented?

Cardie Saunders: It’s patented a patented device. We spent a lot of time, obviously, patent was developed by our team.  But we spend a lot of time building the brand and doing a lot of efforts into getting customers familiar with the product, testing it…

Raj Patel: We’ve got over 148 pilots…

Cardie Saunders: One fifty-one now.

Raj Patel: One fifty-one. So yeah. Heavily-tested.

Ben Lack: And someone’s going to come to you guys and say, “Okay, I like the features and benefits. What’s it going to cost me? What type of return on investment am I going to see? And what’s a typical savings that I’m going to get for this?

Raj Patel: Well, that’s the best part of it. The price-point is $499. That’s our retail price. And many customers can expect an ROI of six months. We say six to twelve months. Now I’ve seen cases where it’s even less than that, depending on the efficiency of the cooler and the age of the walk-in unit that the customer has. But it’s a tremendous value proposition. Most energy-saving devices, retro-fit devices and whatnot have a heavy upfront install component which we do not and have ROIs measured in years. And our literally measures in days, ninety days, one hundred and twenty days sometimes.

Cardie Saunders: You see the buzz about solar. And solar, that’s seven years after the rebate. And the ROI Raj is referring to are for non-rebated products. So this is actually no forms go back to the government, no rebates to obtain. This is right, straight out of the gate. And it’s a low-cap-ex. You’re looking at dollar items, not you spend ten thousand, and you know a two-year ROI on ten thousand is still a one-year ROI, it’s still a no-brainer. But when it’s on $499, it now takes the cap exout of the equation.

Ben Lack: So who’s going to install the product? Is it going to be you? Is it easier enough for the customer to install themselves?

Raj Patel: It is easier for the customer to do it. There’s many options. You can have your regular fridge technician do it on his next scheduled visit. We can send a vendor to do it. But there’s instructions that come right in the box that clearly spell out a self-install process in five minutes. Simple, stupid process. You just plug and play. And you start saving from day one.

Ben Lack: And what’s the actual life of the product itself? A lot of time these energy-saving devices, they’re out on the market. They work great for a year, and then they crap out.

Cardie Saunders: Well, we try not to tell everybody, but the truth is it will outlast your refrigerator. The reason’s that’s true is there’s no electrical or mechanical parts. So you have nothing to break. We offer a five-year warranty, but really for all intents and purposes, it’s lifetime. It’s really wax inside of a box, you remove the device. When your refrigerator dies, you move it to a new piece of equipment and put it right on.

Ben Lack: Distribution model is going to straight to the end-user?

Cardie Saunders: Well, we’re doing both. Well, we have, in fact, Raj and I are pretty excited. We just signed a deal with Sysco. So they’re going to be representing the product nationwide which is going to be a big plus for us. They have 8,500 reps. So we do go through channels like that including some small restaurants obviously. The good news about it is it’s such a cheap product for $499. The bad news is it’s hard for us to go and make a direct-sales call on a guy that sells two units. So we’ve now partnered with some of the distributors, and we sell those like Cisco to help reach those smaller audiences because it’s a great benefit to them.

Ben Lack: That’s a huge win for you guys. So tell me a little bit about why you guys are in the business. Why are you doing what you do?

Raj Patel: First of all, customers are hard to come by, especially in the restaurant business or any business these days. And if you can make more money off of your operations, that is a tremendous help to small business owners these days. So that’s one big piece for us to do what we do and for the customer buying eCube. But I was in a lot of other businesses in my past, and I really wanted to do something I could be proud of at the end of the day. From the video, you can see that refrigeration accounts for a good twenty percent of carbon dioxide emissions globally. If we can make a substantial dent into that, then that’s something that we can really be proud of. And we’re doing our part to bring that carbon dioxide level down.

Cardie Saunders: Yeah, Raj makes a great point. Restaurants today are looking to save money all over the place. Some people are cutting portions or cutting quality or cutting marketing. And being a marketing guy, that’s my background, that’s the last thing you should be doing in a bad economy is cutting your marketing. So how do you save money without lowering your quality or your quantity? And so we can do that. No impact on the customers, and they can drop a profit to make the  bottom line. So I’m a small business supporter myself. And Raj did make a good point. I really love helping that small entrepreneur get off the ground and be successful.

Ben Lack: Where can somebody find you? They’re going to see this interview, and it’s online. Where is somebody going to find more information about eCube?

Raj Patel: Well, you can go to www.nrgsolutionsusa.com. You can also go to www.getecube.com. And you can reach us at our phone number. We can always talk to you. It’s 1-877-99-ECUBE begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              1-877-99-ECUBE      end_of_the_skype_highlighting.

Ben Lack: Awesome. Well, guys, thanks so much for your time. Much success to you going forward and look forward to staying in touch.

Raj Patel: Thank you.

Cardie Saunders: Thanks, Ben.

Ben Lack: Thanks.

Related Posts:

• No Related Posts