An energy firm in the United States has resorted to a novel approach to helping its customers save energy – by asking for funny home videos.

Utah-based Rocky Mountain Power ran a competition called Act wattsmart, offering $10,000 (£6,500) worth of energy saving kit to the best video about energy efficiency.

The contest prize was awarded to a video featuring a ukulele-strumming mum while her children ‘play’ instruments, as she complains about her old dishwasher and longs for a boiler that uses “way less” energy.

The family perform an original song with the winning lyrics: “We bought a house built in 1979, Doo doo doo, it’s a great big house that suits us really fine… Dishwasher, oven, all these need to go, windows that block out all the cold”.