Climatrix

About Climatrix

Climatrix is a leading provider of eco-friendly HVAC systems and offer innovative, low energy consuming alternative to traditional heating and cooling systems.

Market Offerings:
HVAC manufacturing and distribution

Industry:
Manufacturing

Company Size:
25-150 employees (Mid-market)

Region:
Belgium & Western Europe

Use Case:

Prospecting new customers
Monitoring Customers and Suppliers
Monitoring Competitors

Key Products:

Domestic Business Reports
International Business Report
Monitoring Alerts

Disrupting the HVAC Industry

2012

As our world gets hotter and extreme temperatures become a norm, cooling and heating technologies are at the forefront of change. They are under pressure from consumers and government bodies to become more affordable while also consuming less energy and curbing the release of heat-trapping gases.

When Kim Vaessen first entered the HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, and Air conditioning) industry, she knew her purpose was to reinvent traditional HVAC systems so that they are beneficial to both: our homes and our planet.

With a background in marketing and economic policy coupled with the unique vantage point of learning from her family’s long-standing HVAC manufacturing business, Kim established Climatrix in 2011 in Dilsen-Stokkem (province of Limburg) in Belgium.

Climatrix offered an eco-friendly alternative to HVAC systems, with energy-efficient floor and ceiling heating and cooling solutions that often utilized renewable energy sources, helping users save money. However, as larger competitors began introducing their own variants of eco-friendly HVAC products, Climatrix pivoted to target local installers and small construction firms rather than established wholesalers to sell their technology.

Working with sole traders and local installers was risky, because we couldn’t gather much data on their financial histories.

Kim Vaessen
Chief Executive Officer, Climatrix

“Working with sole traders and local installers was risky because we couldn’t gather much data on their financial histories,” says Kim. “The market was full of rumors of a soon-to-be-launching referendum to make all buildings carbon neutral in the near future. So, most of our large competitors also started rolling out climate-friendly HVAC machines, and we had to find a segment they hadn’t approached yet.”

This strategy allowed Climatrix to tap into a promising market. Within the first few years of launching, Climatrix received an influx of online enquiries from local installers. And while some of these led to foundation-building revenue for the HVAC manufacturer, others left them with empty enquiries, unsigned contracts, and several instances of delayed and missed payments.

“We lacked visibility into the financial histories of these leads and prospects,” says Kim. “We realized that getting that visibility and clarity into who is approaching us and who we are approaching will be the key to our scaling strategy.”

Climatrix choosing GraydonCreditsafe as it's risk management partner

Scaling up using ‘financially-sound’ prospecting with GraydonCreditsafe

2014

Through her family's HVAC firm, Kim had prior experience and insight into GraydonCreditsafe's extensive data coverage in the Belgian market. This experience helped Kim shape Climatrix’s prospecting strategy, centered around credit-checking, using GraydonCreditsafe's coverage of local sole traders and SMEs to gain better visibility on prospects and customers before approaching them.

Their ‘financially-sound’ prospecting strategy followed a two-pronged approach:

Onboarding only ‘financially-sound’ customers with credit checks
For the entirety of their sales cycle, from prospecting a new customer to onboarding them, Climatrix’s sales teams began relying on GraydonCreditsafe’s Belgium and International credit reports to gather all the insights they needed to pursue and perform due-diligence on a new, prospective client.

Their salespeople used the reports to gain essential insights, ranging from basic payment data such as credit scores, days beyond terms, and credit limits to more intricate indicators like trade payment data, probability of default, and ownership structures.

This form of thorough analysis helped uncover any signs of a troubled financial history, parent companies and complex ownership structures, and various other risk factors that might otherwise be obscured by a company’s annual revenue, branded associations, and marketing tactics.

In an effort to further embed the practice of credit within the sales culture, salespeople were given additional responsibilities for credit collection and managing overdue accounts. It helped in further boosting their accountability toward onboarding financially reliable customers.

We realized that getting that visibility and clarity into who is approaching us and who we are approaching will be the key to our scaling strategy.

Kim Vaessen
Chief Executive Officer, Climatrix

Insuring Climatrix’s client portfolio with credit insurance & GraydonCreditsafe scores
As an added protective measure, Climatrix insured their client portfolio to secure reimbursements against any payment defaults. To meet the mandatory account due diligence requirements for insurance, Climatrix was able to use GraydonCreditsafe's globally accredited credit scores, which helped expedite their partnership with the insurance provider.

Climatrix's prospecting strategy with the help of GraydonCreditsafe

Why monitoring customers & competitors is key to risk control

2019

For fast-scaling startups like Climatrix, risk management doesn’t just stop at customer onboarding. To minimize risks as they scaled, Climatrix added their customer portfolio to GraydonCreditsafe’s monitoring tool to track real-time changes in their customers’ financial profiles

This approach proved particularly valuable to safeguard themselves against uncertainties in the market, such as:

Navigating uncertainties during COVID-19
When the coronavirus pandemic hit, Kim became increasingly concerned about potential delays and uncertainties in receiving payments from customers. To protect Climatrix's cash flow, Kim realized the need to closely monitor the cash flow health and payment history of clients.

Using GraydonCreditsafe’s monitoring alerts tool, Climatrix added the majority of its customers to be tracked for a wide range of company events. These events included basic changes such as credit score adjustments, company name updates, ownership transfers, as well as more obscure updates like changes in ultimate holding, notices of dissolution, or liquidation warnings.

They set up monitoring alerts on a daily schedule and received immediate updates on any changes in customer events.

“I use it every day and never miss the morning monitoring emails we receive. We always open and check them,” says Kim. “It’s like keeping a finger on the pulse of the market and our customer portfolio. Maybe there’s a change in the management of one of our customers or delay in their account filings – it helps to keep tabs without having to check on them regularly.”

46%

GROWTH IN
CUSTOMER PORTFOLIO
IN A YEAR

300+

ACTIVE CUSTOMERS
(INSTALLERS, WHOLESALERS, END BUYERS)

2016

ONBOARDED GRAYDONCREDITSAFE AS A RISK MANAGEMENT PARTNER

Keeping close tabs on competitors
Climatrix split its scaling plans across two main avenues: securing larger customers and outpacing the competition, and both require a significant level of clarity and visibility into their customers and the market.

“Our growth last year was quite robust. We grew by 46%,” says Kim. “But competition is making things a bit more challenging with our competitors lowering their prices each year.”

With access to GraydonCreditsafe’s Belgian and International data, the Climatrix team is not only able to keep close tabs on the changing credit profiles of competitors, but they are also able to search, screen, and map a larger base for prospecting – beyond the construction space and even in international markets, as eco-friendly HVAC systems begin to gain popularity under the new climate regulations rolling out across Europe.

“Whenever there’s a new entrant in the market or a competitor who’s come too close to our price scale, it helps to keep a close eye on them and their financials,” says Kim.

How Climatrix monitors customers and competitors using GraydonCreditsafe

Climatrix's partnership with GraydonCreditsafe

Scale with a risk-management partner vs. a credit-report provider

2024

Despite the price wars and the early run-ins with risky customers, it is clear that what’s kept Climatrix growing in the face of all challenges is its mission to make temperature systems sustainable and accessible for everyon

Kim explains, “Climatrix does more than just provide comfortable home temperatures for our customers, it can trigger a shift in their mindset toward sustainability. Each one of customers can contribute to lesser carbon footprint anytime they switch on their heaters.”

Kim and the Climatrix team regard data, analytics, and insights they receive from GraydonCreditsafe’s Credit Reports and Monitoring alerts as cornerstones for making any business decision as they move forward with their future growth plans. However, what they value the most with GraydonCreditsafe is beyond just the data and insights they receive.

“We never saw ourselves as a transactional provider of temperature systems to our customers,” says Kim. “Similarly, what we enjoyed from working with GraydonCreditsafe is the partnership and reliability we’ve received, maybe even over the supply or data and reports, through all these years.”

What we enjoyed from working with GraydonCreditsafe is the partnership and reliability we’ve received, maybe even over the supply or data and reports, through all these years.”

Kim Vaessen
Chief Executive Officer, Climatrix