For most small business owners, solar is a great idea because they're going to save a lot of money in a short amount of time.
My name is Grant Miles.
I run a small business called Cheaper by Miles.
Hi, I'm Ben.
I'm the store manager here.
Our aim is to give people a cheaper grocery bill day in, day out.
Here we have a mission to reduce food waste.
Having solar power is a huge saving for us.
It was a very simple exercise to decide that it was viable and worth spending the money.
We use a lot of refrigeration in our business.
We have a lot of fridges, freezers, a cool room, lights.
It’s summer now, we're going to use a lot of air con.
We're using most of the power or the highest rate of power during the day when the solar system is working its hardest.
Which is very beneficial to our business.
So solar will help a lot with the energy consumption in a day.
The upfront cost for us was about ten and a half thousand.
That was after receiving the Solar Victoria rebate.
I guess the amount of electricity that we use, our estimate is that we will pay it off in around about two and a half years.
Part of the application process for Solar Vic was that I should have permission from my landlord.
So I contacted him and asked him if he would be open to us putting solar power on.
He was very interested.
He wanted to know all the details.
He came down and met with me and we discussed it and he was very happy.
He had no qualms whatsoever about agreeing to us putting solar power in.
I always say that installing solar is like that old Chinese proverb.
You know, the best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, and the second best time is now.
Solar power is exactly the same.
Solar power helps us to reduce costs.
Let's us keep our prices very low and makes us feel good about what we're doing for the environment.
We feel very proud of what we do and we'd like to continue to do it for a long time into the future.
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