I have already built one energy consultancy.

The first time around, expansion was fairly easy to recognise. More clients meant more people, more systems and more complexity to keep everything moving.

But one of the things I valued most was much harder to measure.

It was the opportunity to work with particular people and organisations over a long period, rather than appearing intermittently whenever an energy contract was approaching expiry or a problem needed fixing.

The longer you work with an organisation, the more useful your advice can become.

You understand how decisions are really made, who needs budget certainty, where the consumption data is unreliable, which supplier issues keep returning and what the client will need long after the contract has been signed.

You stop feeling like the consultant who arrived for a project.

You become part of how the work gets done.

The best advice often comes from knowing what happens between tenders

An energy procurement consultancy can run a perfectly competent tender without having worked with the client before.

It can collect the data, approach suppliers, compare proposals and recommend a contract.

But over time, the conversation becomes broader.

You begin to understand the client's energy risk appetite, how much price certainty the organisation needs, which contract structures have worked well and where previous problems have occurred.

Instead of asking only, "What contract should we procure this year?", you can start asking:

• What should the energy procurement strategy be over the next three years?

• Which risks should be fixed, passed through or actively managed?

• Are invoices being checked against the contract that was negotiated?

• Are recurring billing and data problems being identified?

• Is somebody looking ahead to the next procurement decision before it becomes urgent?

That is the difference between simply running an energy tender and helping an organisation manage energy over time.

Why this matters for commercial property managers

Commercial property managers and managing agents already work through long-term client relationships.

They understand the buildings, portfolios, owners, tenants and operational pressures involved.

They are also frequently the people dealing with what happens after an energy procurement exercise has finished.

When an invoice is wrong, consumption changes unexpectedly, a supplier query remains unresolved or a landlord wants to understand a material cost movement, somebody still has to deal with it.

Energy does not disappear between contract renewals.

For managing agents wanting to provide stronger energy support, there is an obvious opportunity.

The challenge is deciding how much specialist capability to build internally.

Building an energy capability involves more than procurement

Providing energy procurement services properly requires more than obtaining supplier prices.

There is data preparation, tender design, supplier engagement, evaluation, contract review and award.

There may also be energy invoice validation, bill reconciliation, consumption monitoring, supplier governance and ongoing reporting.

More complex portfolios can require an energy procurement strategy covering fixed or flexible energy contracts, non-commodity cost exposure, renewable procurement and future purchasing decisions.

Maintaining the supplier network, systems and specialist knowledge behind all of this requires time and investment.

A managing agent can build that capability internally.

But it does not necessarily have to.

The partnership model

An alternative is for the managing agent to partner with a specialist energy procurement consultancy.

This does not need to mean introducing a third party, handing over the client and stepping away.

The managing agent can retain its existing client relationship, while the energy specialist works alongside it as an extension of the wider service.

Depending on the portfolio, that support could include:

• energy procurement strategy

• electricity and gas tendering

• supplier engagement and evaluation

• contract review and negotiation support

• consumption data management

• energy invoice validation

• billing discrepancy investigation

• supplier governance and escalation

• cost and consumption reporting

• ongoing energy procurement oversight

The precise responsibilities can vary.

What matters is that the client gains specialist capability without the managing agent having to recreate an entire energy procurement and bureau operation internally.

Clear accountability is essential

Any partnership model needs clear procurement governance.

The client should know who owns the relationship, who manages suppliers, who investigates invoice discrepancies and who is responsible for progressing decisions.

Responsibilities should therefore be agreed before the service begins.

Done properly, the client should not feel that another layer has been inserted between them and the answer.

The opposite should happen.

The managing agent should be able to bring more specialist knowledge into the relationship while maintaining a coherent client experience.

The value is often after the contract is signed

Energy procurement can become disproportionately focused on the tender.

A great deal of attention is given to obtaining prices, comparing suppliers and securing the contract.

Those things matter.

But a contract might run for several years, while the tender itself occupies only a small part of that period.

Did the supplier implement the agreement correctly?

Are the negotiated charges appearing on invoices?

Has consumption changed?

Have sites entered or left the portfolio?

Does the procurement strategy still reflect what the client needs?

This is where an ongoing relationship can become considerably more valuable than a sequence of isolated procurement exercises.

The history does not disappear every time a contract comes up for renewal.

Expansion, measured differently

As I build Prime Procurement in the UK, my previous experience is shaping the kind of expansion I am looking for.

Of course, I want the business to grow.

But I am less interested in building a long list of organisations that we hear from once every few years when an energy tender appears in somebody's diary.

I would rather build a smaller number of trusted relationships where we genuinely get to know the people, portfolios and commercial pressures involved.

That is why the partnership model with commercial property managers and managing agents appeals to me.

Prime Procurement can provide the specialist energy procurement and ongoing bureau capability behind an existing property management relationship, supporting tenders, contracts, invoices, consumption data, reporting and supplier issues.

The managing agent expands its capability without having to build everything internally.

The client receives greater continuity between procurement decisions and the years of energy management that follow.

And Prime Procurement becomes part of an ongoing working relationship rather than appearing only when a contract is due to expire.

For me, that is a more interesting way to measure expansion.