Are there events you are keeping in-house to source because they are too easy and pricing too tight to consider taking to your eProcurement partner?
Today’s post is by Mark Davis; Sr. Vice President of Operations and CTO at SafeSourcing. Mark asks
We recently ran a very basic event for some office supplies for one of our new customers. During the review of the event which saved over 25% they admitted they were skeptical of what we could achieve because they had been working with their vendor for so long and felt that the spend was too basic to get much more of anything else. They were, of course, ecstatic about the results.
While the eProcurement process should never be solely about price, the fact is that in this arena, just like life, no one wants to pay more for the products and services that they really want.
For someone new to the process of negotiating with several vendors instantly in a forum that allows them to know where they stand, let’s take a look at some of the categories that companies may think they have taken as far as they can go but that likely still have a lot of savings and value left in them.
Shipping/Office Supplies – Many companies feel like they have improved the deals in these categories as far as they can. Because of the shrinking list of National players, long-term relationships and the view that many of these items have become commodities, all contribute to the incorrect perception that they are not good candidates to work with your eProcurement company on. The reality is that many companies can still receive 15-20% in additional savings, rebates and add-on services than what they have today, even from their incumbent.
Printing Services – Printers are typically some of the longest standing relationships that a company has with a vendor. Due to this fact the business aspects of these relationships rarely get closely reviewed as long as there are not major price swings. The reality is that technological improvements in printing have dramatically lowered most printers’ costs leaving a great opportunity to explore for companies looking to understand all of their expenses.
POS Supplies – The retail Point of Sale industry has exploded over the past couple of decades with Value Added Resellers (VARs) coming from everywhere to provide you the products you need to run the front-end of the retail business. As manufacturers step back and let the VARs handle the customer portion of the business, VARs have become more aggressive in the extra services they can offer even if they can’t always change their pricing. Point of sale supplies are great areas to discuss with your eProcurement partner.
For more information on how SafeSourcing can help you with these of any of your other spend categories, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.
We look forward to your comments.
