About Us

ENERGY BROKER

Company Profile

Energy BrokerLive Energy is an energy broker and consultant founded by industry veterans St. Clair Newbern IV and Paul Fershtand. Since 2001 we’ve focused solely on helping businesses make smarter commercial electricity and natural gas buying decisions.

We also help businesses implement energy solutions aimed at decreasing costs through a wide variety of demand side strategies.

Your job is to run your business. Our job is to allow you to execute a comprehensive energy plan that covers all the bases from buying energy to implementing the solutions that truly make economic sense.

We have been serving clients since the day the market opened, and truly aspire to deliver a service unlike any other provider in the market. 

Our approach is to “not sell” anything. We will teach you how to look at the market, show you how it works, and how to leverage deregulation to increase profits, and decrease costs in your business. 

We offer our services on a complimentary basis, so you get a chance to see for yourself that we can do everything we say we can do and more, before making a commitment to us.

St. Clair Newbern IV, CEO & Co-Founder

Direct Phone: 214.699.4441

St. Clair is the in-house, right-brain visionary, and strategist…  the creative one, who spends most of his time interacting with suppliers, and the energy community, processing client feedback, and always obsessing about how to keep deliver value to our clients and make their lives easier.

  • Energy Broker Since 2001
  • Born and raised in Fort Worth, TX
  • Attended the University of Texas at Austin
  • Served as Secretary (2007), VP (2008), and President (2009) of Texas Electricity Professionals Association (TEPA)
  • During his role as President of TEPA, was responsible for launching the Certified Electricity Professional (CEP) certification
  • Also played a major role in shaping the ethical standard, and Code of Conduct that is the back bone of TEPA
  • Obtained Certified Electricity Professional certification in 2009

Paul Fershtand, VP & Co-Founder

Direct Phone: 214.699.4442

Paul is the left brain, market guru, who provides that counter balance to St. Clair.  Paul oversees our pricing operations and manages our portfolio. His team has a hand in every transaction that we do, making sure the wheels are always turning efficiently and accurately, and that we know where the best options for our clients are. There is nobody who has a better pulse on the market on a daily basis than Paul.

  • Energy Broker Since 2001
  • Born and raised in Fort Worth, TX
  • Obtained his Master of Finance degree from TCU
  • Has conducted many thousands of transactions over the past decade
  • Obtained Certified Electricity Professional certification in 2009

Pioneers In The Deregulated Electricity Market

As pioneers in the deregulated Texas commercial electricity market, we have witnessed and participated in an incredible market evolution. Since we dove in in 2001, the landscape has become more complex, and natural gas prices have become much more volatile. We quickly realized that in order to keep up, we needed to build a web-based platform that could track commercial electricity rates and communicate with customers in real time, so they would never miss an opportunity to lock in savings.

After many years of development, we are proud that our vision is now a reality, on which hundreds of businesses rely. The Live Energy Portal is what sets us apart from the rest, and puts us in a category of our own. Often copied, but never duplicated!  With Live Energy you get a team with experience you can trust, as well as the exclusive technology that today’s commercial electricity and natural gas markets require. Add to that a proven 5-step process, and you get a winning combination that you can count on. Contact us today and let us show you how we are different. Rest assured, you will learn a lot by contacting us.

Talk To Us!

So, here’s the deal.  After being in this market since 2001, we have seen it all. Players have come and gone, and we have seen a massive influx lately of people who call themselves “energy brokers”, “energy consultants”, “aggregators”, yada, yada, yada. The problem is that they all claim to have the right experience, the right tools, the right network of retail energy providers, etc.

But the bottom line is that we know for a fact, there is a very short list of really good energy brokers in the market.  We are one of them.  But we know that there is no way for you to know this until you get a chance to talk directly with us – the guys in charge. We built this thing from the ground up, and are passionate about every piece of our operation.  That is why we highly encourage you to contact either Paul or St. Clair directly.

We want you to get a sense of who we are, have a chance to drill us with any questions you have, and make an informed decision about whether we are the right fit for your business. We believe that if you do that with everyone you are considering doing business with, you will easily be able to tell who is the real deal, and who you need to run from.

You have a lot to lose by trusting a slick website, or succumbing to a high pressure sales pitch.  Let’s talk.  If you like what you hear, then we would love the chance to earn your business. If we are not a fit, we may very well recommend one of our friends in the business that would be a better fit.

Energy Broker

Live Energy is a privately held energy broker and consulting firm that’s been helping businesses of all size lower commercial electricity and natural gas costs since deregulation began. Our Certified Energy Advisors will educate you about the market, explain your options, and serve as an unbiased resource you can trust. Our proprietary technology is unlike anything else in the market, and has revolutionized the way businesses control electricity costs by enabling smarter decisions in less time.

Energy Solutions Provider

Live Energy is increasingly becoming involved with helping it’s clients identify and implement energy solutions that can increase efficiency and reliability while reducing costs. We’ll educate you so that you understand the big picture. Then we’ll utilize our simple decision matrix to identify what solutions might make economic sense. When we find viable opportunities we provide support through the entire process of designing, implementing and financing solutions.

Make Me Laugh

The saying goes, “don’t tell me you’re funny – make me laugh”. In a market crowded by faceless, nameless companies, who are high on rhetoric but light on substance, we don’t expect you to take our word for it. We believe it’s our obligation to prove that we can do what we say we can. We’re so confident in our ability, that we ask nothing of you to get started. We make all of our resources, and access to our team of Certified Energy Advisors available to you on a complimentary basis. If you like what we do, and want to engage us, that’s great. If not, we guarantee that you’ll learn things that will help you, regardless.

Proven Process

Our finely tuned 5-Step Process, plus our proprietary technology, the Live Energy Portal, is guaranteed to save you time and money. Contact us today and we’ll show you exactly how to reign in your commercial electricity and natural gas costs, and implement the right energy solutions for your business. We provide custom price alerts, coordinate competitive bidding among the top suppliers, assist in contract negotiation, handle all customer service issues after execution, and a whole lot more. Live Energy is your single source for business electricity and demand side solutions.

80% of All Businesses

Did you know that nearly 80% of businesses of all size utilize an energy broker when buying commercial electricity and natural gas? These smart businesses recognize the risk that deregulation brings, and that they lack the in house resources to make smart decisions. Effectively buying energy for your business requires that you have experience, information, technology, and time. Unfortunately, most decision makers are lacking in one or all of these areas. Consider the following, and ask yourself how your internal resources measure up…

EXPERIENCE. As Certified Electricity Professionals, we understand how the commercial energy markets work, we know all the Retail Energy Providers, and we understand the various product structures. We have procured many thousands of commercial electricity and natural gas contracts, and are transacting everyday on behalf of our clients.

INFORMATION. Aggregating and analyzing market data is a full time job. We filter out the noise, and glean relevant, actionable intelligence so that our clients don’t have to. Generic information is useless. That’s why we only deliver the intelligence that’s relevant to your unique profile. Whether it’s supplier analysis, market monitoring, or regulatory oversight, we push the information you need, when you need to know.

TECHNOLOGY. Live Energy is literally in a class of its own when it comes to our proprietary technology. We track your account in real time, and calculate renewal rates with every tick of the market so we can send automatic price alerts when your targets are hit. Access your profile, accounts, charts and analysis through the Live Energy Portal anytime, or register for notifications via email.

TIME. Even the most savvy buyers love our technology because it allows their strategy to be put on auto pilot, which saves up to 90% of the time it would take to do what our systems can do. Allow us to handle the tedious processes, such as market monitoring, gathering data, coordinating the competitive bid process, negotiating contracts, auditing bills, and resolving all services issues, through a single point of contact. This leaves you to simply make the important decisions, while we do the rest.

We Listened to You

Live Energy was founded on the principle that our services should be based solely on that which our clients have told us will make their lives easier. We understand the frustration of dealing with people who lack the knowledge and tools to do what they say they can do. When it comes to making well-timed commercial electricity or natural gas purchases for your business, nobody in the market offers a more powerful, yet easy to use solution. Whatever your current process is, we challenge you to take a look at how we are different.

Convenient Technology. We deliver customized, real-time commercial electricity rate and informative alerts that are based on your current expiration date and load profile. Along with our guidance, our clients can rely on the Live Energy Portal to identify commercial electricity buying opportunities, and provide the fundamental and technical analysis to validate your decisions.

Long-Term Relationship. We consider our clients and their energy needs to be a long term, ongoing project to continuously shop for the lowest commercial electricity and natural gas rates and relevant market information.

Continuous Market Watch. With the highly volatile energy markets, where timing is everything, there is opportunity to leverage volatility to your advantage. Our tracking tool provides a continuous watch over the market. No vacations, weekends, or sleeping on the job, the Live Energy Portal is always keeping an eye out for our clients.

Client Reputation. Understanding that our clients’ role is to seek solutions specific to their business needs, we help take on that responsibility by understanding their goals, proactively seeking solutions, and providing resources to back decisions. We are here to make you look good.

Experience Is Not Enough

Our philosophy is that experience is critical when choosing an energy broker or consultant, but experience alone is not enough!  If you are a successful energy broker, you will eventually have lots of clients, since this is commercial electricity and natural gas is a high volume, low margin niche. 

After the first couple of years we experienced some major growing pains (around Fall of 2003). Specifically, we felt like we were losing the ability to deliver the highest level of service to every client because we had so many clients in our portfolio, and our technology and processes had not yet caught up.  It was at this time that we stopped taking on new clients, and rethought the whole thing.

We Heard You Loud and Clear

We went straight to our clients to ask them what they wanted from us. What could we do better? Where had we failed? We heard their frustration, and their expectations. They wanted an expert they could trust; an energy broker that had the experience, process, and tools in place to deliver a level of service that instills confidence. 

With that insight as our guide, we set out to revolutionize the way we delivered our services. Having an IT background I knew exactly what we needed to do to become scalable, so that no matter how many clients we acquired, we could promise every single one of them that they would never be neglected or forgotten.

Experience + Technology is Key

They would no longer have to depend on a person to watch their account. Instead we began building the technology that we now call the Live Energy Portal. This is an incredible, proprietary system that we would like to show you. With this tool, no matter what happens day to day, or if your Energy Advisor is out of the office, you will never miss an opportunity to lock in when your savings targets are hit because this has all been automated. 

Further, the alerts come directly to you in real-time, in a very easy to understand format, so there is no need for you to have to log in and try to decipher cryptic market data. Our experience, technology, process, and commitment to PURPOSE defines our company philosophy.

Proven Track Record of Success

Since 2001, Live Energy has worked with businesses of all size, and in virtually every industry. We have developed highly complex buying strategies for the second largest industrial consumers in the state of Texas, and we also work with hundreds of small to medium sized businesses with much more straight forward needs. 

Regardless of your size, Live Energy has the ability to provide proven strategies that are designed to enable smarter decisions in less time, leading to increased profits and lower costs.

Founding Member of TEPA

Live Energy is a founding member of the Texas Electricity Professionals Association.  In 2005, when it became clear to many of the successful energy Brokers, Consultants, and Aggregators (ABCs) that we needed to begin to voluntarily police this new industry, St. Clair Newbern IV quickly got involved with the effort to form TEPA.  Over the years the association has grown into the largest association of its size in the country.  

Our goal was to come together and create a framework of ethical standards, and a code of conduct that we were all willing to voluntarily commit our companies to, in an effort to maintain integrity and accountability in the marketplace.  We are a current member, and have been deeply involved since inception.  St. Clair Newbern IV, CEO of Live Energy, served as Secretary (2007), VP (2008), President (2009), and currently sits on the Board of Directors.

Certified Electricity Professionals

We are a team of professionals. Trained to deliver the highest level of customer service. Live Energy requires that all of it’s Energy Advisors obtain their Certified Electricity Professional certification. This certification is currently the only credential in the country that can be obtained by energy brokers, consultants, or aggregators to verify that they possess the skills required to serve commercial and industrial clients. 

We believe that it is important to note that this certification covers general industry knowledge as well as a special section related to ethics, and the TEPA Code of Conduct. Below is the official description of what the CEP is.

The TEPA Certified Electricity Professional (CEP) certification is a voluntary credentialing process intended to: 1) establish a recognized standard of knowledge, competency and ethics; 2) formally recognize those who meet these standards; and 3) provide buyers seeking the services of an advisor, broker or consultant with a tool to identify skilled, knowledgeable professionals.  By choosing to work with a CEP, you should have confidence that this individual has demonstrated their knowledge of market dynamics, the regulatory landscape, as well as the various types of products available in the deregulated marketplace.

Live Energy operates lawfully in each of the markets below. We are licensed and bonded according to the specific requirements of each market.

  • Illinois
  • Maine
  • Maryland
  • Massachussets
  • New Jersey
  • New York
  • Ohio
  • Pennsylvania
  • Rhode Island
  • Texas
  • Washington D. C.