Case study
Smart AC Provider Doubles Their VPP Growth
Smart AC Provider Doubles Their VPP Growth
Smart AC Provider Doubles Their VPP Growth
Background
Windmill, an innovative home air care company, recognized that virtual power plants (VPPs) offered a powerful opportunity to tap into new revenue streams, deliver additional value to their customers, and drive forward its commitment to sustainability — all without compromising the seamless user experience that defines their brand. With a growing base of smart, grid-connected air conditioners, Windmill set out to enable customers to become active participants in demand response and other grid services programs.
Challenges
Enrollment Timing Misalignment
Despite strong customer demand and a mission-aligned product, Windmill faced a timing mismatch: most customers purchased their air conditioning units during the hottest summer months, well after many grid services program enrollment deadlines had passed. Windmill didn't have a way to collect and manage enrollments after these deadlines had passed, making it difficult to translate peak-season sales into immediate grid revenue.
Operational Complexities
As a lean team managing a fast-growing business, navigating the many steps to launching and managing successful VPPs presented challenges for Windmill. Grid services enrollment often involves fragmented, manual processes that make it difficult to provide a smooth, unified customer experience. Onboarding, dispatching, and settling revenue for large portfolios of residential devices demands tight coordination. Each new program adds layers of operational complexity, with compliance requirements, authorization processes, and market transaction rules often differing from one program to another.
Windmill’s goal to expand its VPP offering into multiple markets hinged on finding the right tools to manage and scale operations without significant internal investment and headcount growth.
About Windmill
Windmill is a modern air care brand developing high-performance, smart, sustainable air products and technology through thoughtful design and innovation. Since its founding, Windmill has been on a mission to bring to market accessible, clean air products that not only perform exceptionally well, but also enhance the aesthetic of any home.
Highlights
90%
Increase in active grid participants from May 2024-2025
About Windmill
Windmill is a modern air care brand developing high-performance, smart, sustainable air products and technology through thoughtful design and innovation. Since its founding, Windmill has been on a mission to bring to market accessible, clean air products that not only perform exceptionally well, but also enhance the aesthetic of any home.
About Windmill
Windmill is a modern air care brand developing high-performance, smart, sustainable air products and technology through thoughtful design and innovation. Since its founding, Windmill has been on a mission to bring to market accessible, clean air products that not only perform exceptionally well, but also enhance the aesthetic of any home.
“Leap’s platform gave us the automation and enrollment tools we needed to stand up, develop, and expand our Windmill Eco Rewards program without sacrificing the best-in-class customer experience that’s core to our overall brand. Thanks to Leap, we’ve been able to turn thousands of smart ACs into grid assets, while growing our VPP footprint across multiple markets with minimal lift from our team.”
Danny Mayer
Co-Founder and Co-CEO at Windmill
Highlights
90%
Increase in active grid participants from May 2024-2025
Simple, Automated Onboarding with Leap Connect
To make enrollment as easy as possible, Windmill embedded Leap Connect directly into their mobile AC app, Windmill Air (available in the App Store and Google Play). This transformed what had traditionally been multi-step, confusing utility authorization processes into a simple, intuitive in-app workflow. With Leap’s technology working behind the scenes, customers can authorize access to their utility account, enroll in Eco Rewards, and begin participating in grid services — all without leaving the Windmill ecosystem.
Leap’s platform also enabled Windmill to implement automated and timely reminder flows to ensure that customers who begin onboarding successfully complete the process.
Simple, Automated Onboarding with Leap Connect
To make enrollment as easy as possible, Windmill embedded Leap Connect directly into their mobile AC app, Windmill Air (available in the App Store and Google Play). This transformed what had traditionally been multi-step, confusing utility authorization processes into a simple, intuitive in-app workflow. With Leap’s technology working behind the scenes, customers can authorize access to their utility account, enroll in Eco Rewards, and begin participating in grid services - all without leaving the Windmill ecosystem.
Background
Windmill, an innovative home air care company, recognized that virtual power plants (VPPs) offered a powerful opportunity to tap into new revenue streams, deliver additional value to their customers, and drive forward its commitment to sustainability - all without compromising the seamless user experience that defines their brand. With a growing base of smart, grid-connected air conditioners, Windmill set out to enable customers to become active participants in demand response and other grid services programs.
Challenges
Enrollment Timing Misalignment
Despite strong customer demand and a mission-aligned product, Windmill faced a timing mismatch: most customers purchased their air conditioning units during the hottest summer months, well after grid services program enrollment deadlines had passed. Windmill didn't have a way to collect and manage enrollments after these deadlines had passed, making it difficult to translate peak-season sales into immediate grid revenue.
Operational Complexities
As a lean team managing a fast-growing business, navigating the many steps to launching and managing successful VPPs presented challenges for Windmill. Grid services enrollment often involves fragmented, manual processes that make it difficult to provide a smooth, unified customer experience. Onboarding, dispatching, and settling revenue for large portfolios of residential devices demands tight coordination. Each new program adds layers of operational complexity, with compliance requirements, authorization processes, and market transaction rules often differing from one program to another.
Windmill’s goal to expand its VPP offering into multiple markets hinged on finding the right tools to manage and scale operations without significant internal investment and headcount growth.
The Solution
Windmill partnered with Leap to build a streamlined, scalable enrollment engine and deliver a high-quality VPP experience across multiple markets. Leap’s automation capabilities, strategic insights, and flexible program infrastructure enabled Windmill to accelerate growth and unlock new customer value.
Creative Marketing & Value Proposition Development
Leveraging marketing insights from Leap’s growth team, Windmill took a thoughtful and innovative approach to developing its customer value proposition for its Eco Rewards grid services offering. In addition to various incentives, they ran enrollment campaigns that aligned upselling with Eco Rewards participation, such as discounts on air filters for their ACs and other add-ons for customers who signed up for grid services. Customers were also incentivized not just to enroll, but to actively participate in grid events, increasing engagement and overall impact.
Windmill also ran early-stage A/B tests on messaging to better understand customer motivations and conversion levers. This data-informed approach helped them build tailored, effective enrollment campaigns.
Flexible Enrollment Timing
Leap’s platform allowed customers to enroll via Leap Connect throughout the summer, even after external program deadlines had passed. This ensured that Windmill could drive grid services customer acquisition during their peak sales season, encouraging enrollment while the customer was installing their new product and completing mobile app setup.
Automating VPP Operations
In addition to automated customer notifications, Windmill used Leap’s APIs to automate key backend operations, including meter management and dispatch event scheduling. With Leap’s platform doing the heavy lifting to transact in grid programs, Windmill’s team could focus on marketing, growth, and customer experience. These automations have allowed Windmill to manage VPPs with over 1,500 customers across California and New York with fewer than 10 person-hours of work per month.
Built to Scale Across Markets
Leap’s universal APIs and market interface enabled Windmill to expand to new programs and geographies without duplicating development efforts. This scalable architecture has helped the company to amortize its technology investments and reach more customers without significantly increasing operational costs or headcount.
The Solution
Windmill partnered with Leap to build a streamlined, scalable enrollment engine and deliver a high-quality VPP experience across multiple markets. Leap’s automation capabilities, strategic insights, and flexible program infrastructure enabled Windmill to accelerate growth and unlock new customer value.
Creative Marketing & Value Proposition Development
Leveraging marketing insights from Leap’s growth team, Windmill took a thoughtful and innovative approach to developing its customer value proposition for its Eco Rewards grid services offering. In addition to various incentives, they ran enrollment campaigns that upselling with Eco Rewards participation, such as discounts on air filters for their ACs and other add-ons for customers who signed up for grid services. Customers were also incentivized not just to enroll, but to actively participate in grid events, increasing engagement and overall impact.
Windmill also ran early-stage A/B tests on messaging to better understand customer motivations and conversion levers. This data-informed approach helped them build tailored, effective enrollment campaigns.
Simple, Automated Onboarding with Leap Connect
To make enrollment as easy as possible, Windmill embedded Leap Connect directly into their mobile AC app, Windmill Air (available in the App Store and Google Play). This transformed what had traditionally been multi-step, confusing utility authorization processes into a simple, intuitive in-app workflow. With Leap’s technology working behind the scenes, customers can authorize access to their utility account, enroll in Eco Rewards, and begin participating in grid services - all without leaving the Windmill ecosystem.
Leap’s platform also enabled Windmill to implement automated and timely reminder flows to ensure that customers who begin onboarding successfully complete the process.
Flexible Enrollment Timing
Leap’s platform allowed customers to enroll via Leap Connect throughout the summer, even after external program deadlines had passed. This ensured that Windmill could drive grid services customer acquisition during their peak sales season, encouraging enrollment while the customer was installing their new product and completing mobile app setup.
Automating VPP Operations
In addition to automated customer notifications, Windmill used Leap’s APIs to automate key backend operations, including meter management and dispatch event scheduling. With Leap’s platform doing the heavy lifting to transact in grid programs, Windmill’s team could focus on marketing, growth, and customer experience. These automations have allowed Windmill to support VPPs across California and New York with over 1,500 customers with less than 10 hours of work per month.
Built to Scale Across Markets
Leap’s universal APIs and market interface enabled Windmill to expand to new programs and geographies without duplicating development efforts. This scalable architecture has helped the company to amortize its technology investments and reach more customers without significantly increasing operational costs or headcount.
Leap’s platform also enabled Windmill to implement automated and timely reminder flows to ensure that customers who begin onboarding successfully complete the process.
Flexible Enrollment Timing
Leap’s platform allowed customers to enroll via Leap Connect throughout the summer, even after external program deadlines had passed. This ensured that Windmill could drive grid services customer acquisition during their peak sales season, encouraging enrollment while the customer was installing their new product and completing mobile app setup.
Automating VPP Operations
In addition to automated customer notifications, Windmill used Leap’s APIs to automate key backend operations, including meter management and dispatch event scheduling. With Leap’s platform doing the heavy lifting to transact in grid programs, Windmill’s team could focus on marketing, growth, and customer experience. These automations have allowed Windmill to support VPPs across California and New York with over 1,500 customers with less than 10 hours of work per month.
Built to Scale Across Markets
Leap’s universal APIs and market interface enabled Windmill to expand to new programs and geographies without duplicating development efforts. This scalable architecture has helped the company to amortize its technology investments and reach more customers without significantly increasing operational costs or headcount.
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© Leapfrog Power, Inc. 2025. All Rights Reserved.
© Leapfrog Power, Inc. 2025. All Rights Reserved.