Do it for Colin the pole dancer: switch energy deals

Outlook

What ever happened to the hot pants? Their impact was all over Moneysupermarket’s results but they hardly merited a mention.

For those who have been hiding under a rock, the hot pants were worn by “Dave”, an actor screened strutting his way down a street in a pair of hot pants, passing Sharon Osbourne en route.

Such ads are catnip to the sort of business Moneysupermarket is in because they drive clicks. Dave became the industry’s king of the hill, strutting over rivals’ meerkats and Welsh opera singers in the process.

Dave helped to drive an 18 per cent rise in revenues to £144m and a 28 per cent rise in operating profits at the company he’s been promoting.

I’ve said before that while price- comparison sites aren’t always the consumer champions they pretend to be, they can be very useful. That’s particularly so in the case of energy, where more switching would do much to curb some of the abuses that have been exposed in the market. It has been on the rise at Moneysupermarket, doing almost as much as Dave for the results in fuelling a 93 per cent rise in home services revenues.

However, Centrica’s profits show the service is still under-used. And Dave’s been retired (for now) in favour of Colin, a plus-size builder with a fondness for pole dancing.