Møbelringen acts to become sustainable and save energy usage in their shops

Retail has been hit hard by the high electricity prices, both through high operating costs, but perhaps even more because consumers have reprioritized their economy. This has especially affected stores within building materials, sports, furniture and electronics.

Møbelringen is a chain of funiture shops in Norway. The shops Møbelringen I Bjørnsen Bryne and Egersund wanted to take climate action even before the war in Ukraine and the energy crisis. They chose ClevAir to reduce energy consumption and CO2 emissions related to ventilation in the stores. The ClevAir solution was installed a year ago and with visible savings, several Møbelringen stores are now in line. Now ClevAir has also been turned on in the stores in Forus and Hamar, and the ventilation is automatically adjusted to how many customers are present in the stores.

Win-win situation for the shop owner, the customers and the environment

With sensors that measure indoor air quality and temperature in the stores, Møbelringen ensures that the customers experience the visit comfortably, at the same time the ventilation can be turned down during the periods when there are few customers and thereby saving electricity and CO2 emissions. It provides corresponding savings on the electricity bill for the shop owner, and the investment will quickly pay for itself.

Christian Lea Bjørnsen owner of Møbelringen I Bjørnsen Lyngdal, Egersund and Bryne tells:

We have worked on a long term to reduce electricity, today we use just under 50 kWh per m2, 10 years ago we used 122 kwh per m2.

Our stores are large premises, we have periods with many people in the store and periods with few people, therefore the ClevAir solution suits us well. I see that ClevAir paid for itself in about 6 months, and I especially like that the technology also provides savings on cooling by keeping the nighttime low temperature when the weather forecast predicts a hot day.

Predictability is important for good operations

We have taken several energy-saving actions, like new windows, led lighting with sensor control, re-insulated the roof, changed the garage door. Three of our properties are of an older date, from 1956, 1972, 1986 (the fourth is from 2016), yet we only have a consumption of 50 kWh per m2. As reference the Sintef's scale shows that the norm for shops is almost 300 kWh per m2. We have also signed a fixed price agreement for electricity and, as an example, for the shop in Bryne, which is 3,500 m2 in size, we had an electricity bill in January of 15,000 (+VAT and transmission tariff) and 10,500 in February (+VAT and transmission tariff), so my advice to other shop owners is to initiate measures quickly if it is not already in place.

Next step will be to find a solution to cut the power peaks. We see that we exceed our quota in the morning where the heating starts, if we can change some of the consumption in time, we will pay less.

Looking forward to gain controll

Andreas Pinnerød owns the Møbelringen shops Studio Stavanger, Tromsø, Fredrikstad, Hamar and Forus. He started searching for ways to reduce energy consumption shortly after he opened the Hamar store 4 years ago in a new building. The climate at Hamar offers very cold months compared to the store in Fredrikstad, and as the store is not located in a centre, the outside temperature directly impacts the energy consumption. Andreas says, I noticed that we did not optimize energy consumption and as electricity prices have increased, the need to do something became urgent. I chose ClevAir, as they have good documentation of results from previous customers and the solution also works even though the building, we rent does not have an BMS. In addition to Hamar, I chose Forus, also since it hasn’t a BMS and that the building has a relatively high electricity consumption. I am looking forward to gaining control of the energy consumption related to ventilation and hope to be able to save 25%. It is of course nice also to save CO2 emissions, but when you high fixed costs, environmental actions must also be profitable.

Key Account Manager in ClevAir Nicolai Thon Wicklund ads; we are happy to help Møbelringen, these are stores with a lot of square meters and a varying flow of customers. Just think about your own Saturday activities; if it's a sunny day you want to be outside or spontaneously invite friends to a barbecue, while rainy days are used for, for example, a trip to furniture stores. Adjusting the ventilation to such variations in customers can have a major impact on the electricity bill and, not least, reduce the store's CO2 footprint. And that without major investments.

About Møbelringen

Møbelringen was established in 1985 in Norway and has today 70 member owned shops covering all of Norway. Møbelringen focus on customer service, to offer knowledge and funiture of quality in order for customers to make gode and long-lasting decisions. Møbelringen is certified sustainable of both company, production as well as quality and environmental certified furniture.

About ClevAir

ClevAir is a Norwegian developed software solution for automated and optimized control of ventilation systems in commercial buildings. ClevAir optimizes the ventilation in real time, based on measurements of occupancy, air quality and weather forecasts. In that way overconsumption is cut, you normally save 15-25% of energy consumption and not least CO2 emissions.