Today’s post is by Dave Wenig, Senior Vice President of Sales and Services at SafeSourcing.

Of all the different categories we source across the different industries we support, there are a few that stand out as consistently delivering savings well above the 24.8% average we regularly talk about. One such category is consultants in the healthcare industry.

To illustrate that point, I’ll highlight an example where we worked with one of our healthcare customers to source their Pharmacy Benefits Manager (PBM) Consultant services using a two phase process. In the first phase, we began with an RFP and in the second phase we finished with an RFQ.

During the RFP, we ensured that all of the participating vendors were well qualified to provide the financial audit of their claims, assessing current PBM practices and claims data to ensure that proper and accurate management of the prescription plan is occurring. We also made certain that the vendors were well qualified in other ways such as meeting the criteria outlined by the business for partners. Once we had that initial starting point, we were able to proceed to the RFQ.

In the RFQ portion, we saw amazing opportunity for savings. How high was the savings? 70.37%. Over the course of 38 minutes we hosted an RFQ in which 7 of the finalist vendors from the RFP participated and competed to earn the business of our customer.

While this example is really interesting, it actually isn’t unique. RFQs for consultant services in the healthcare industry typically yield impressive results well in excess of our 24.8% average.

How would you like to enhance the negotiations with your contractors before you engage them for their next audit? Reach out and we’ll be happy to share our thoughts and experience.

If you would like more information on how SafeSourcing can help your procurement efforts, or on our Risk Free trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative. We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

Today’s post is by Dave Wenig, Senior Vice President of Sales and Services at SafeSourcing Inc.

The word essential has seen so much more use in the past 10 months or so. Because of this, many of us have had a chance to stop and think whether we are an essential worker and what that really means. I mention this to help point out that the word can sometimes be subjective.

During the last 10 months, I have had a lot of really interesting conversations with people in all sorts of roles in their different organizations. I have heard a lot about their trials and the new and unforeseen challenges they have faced.

What I have come to see as an outside observer with a wider view of how people approach similar challenges is that it can be hard to see past the challenges that are right in front of us. Here are the top three challenges and why the SafeSourcing’s services are essential even in the face of them.

1. New and ongoing challenges. While it sometimes feels like we have all settled into the changes we had to make to adjust to the pandemic, the reality is this is not behind us. Staffing issues and ongoing workplace safety concerns take too much attention. But that is actually a reason why you should be working with SafeSourcing. We stay focused on your procurement-related initiatives so you can focus on all the new challenges that you have to face. There is no reason to have to choose between the efforts.
2. There just are not enough resources. For too many of our customers, they must do more with less. Between layoffs, furloughs, and absences, there is a pretty good chance we have all felt a strain. Here again, SafeSourcing is an extension of your own team. We can assist you, so you do not have to worry about spreading yourself too thin. You will reduce expenses and can use that savings to acquire more resources.
3. My other responsibilities are higher priorities. Managing your costs directly relates to any of your other strategic responsibilities. Whether you are responsible for sales, HR, IT, or any other role, I guarantee your own goals are in line with managing costs. If you are responsible for growing your company’s revenue, you should also be concerned with improving your company’s gross margin. At the end of the day, everyone in the organization needs to be responsible stewards of its expenses. You keep your eye on your goals and bring us on to keep our eye on your costs.

The main takeaway is that if you can keep an open mind about the benefits of strategic sourcing, you will find that one of the biggest is that it can be a great solution to your challenges both now and in the future.

If  you would like more information on how SafeSourcing can help you, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service representative.  We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

Today’s question is from Ron Southard, CEO at SafeSourcing Inc.

What is a fair price increase? What type of margin should your Manufacturer be making? These are tough but fair questions that you should be asking of them every day. So, maybe in some cases it’s time to consider other than single source of supply opportunities. Maybe in other cases it’s time to consider multiple Manufacturers in order to meet your service level requirements. What language can you add to your contracts that ensures that your prices don’t rise? What indices should you be leveraging in order to mitigate in contract price increases?

If you’re interested in keeping your costs in line with reality or maybe even getting better pricing and service, contact SafeSourcing because we have done this many times for many companies in many industries.

 Today’s blog is by Gayl Southard, for SafeSourcing.

For years the general public has been advised to use sunscreen when out at the beach or while enjoying outside activities in order to prevent skin damage.  Recently, Neutrogena and Aveeno have voluntarily recalled their sunscreen products that contain benzene (a cancer-causing ingredient).   According to the National Cancer Institute, exposure to benzene can lead to leukemia and other blood disorders.  CVS Health stopped selling two of their after-sun care products due to suspected toxins. The majority of sunscreens have no problems; however, the following products have voluntarily been recalled:

Neutrogena Beach Defense (aerosol)

Neutrogena Cool Dry Sport (aerosol)

Neutrogena Invisible Daily Defense (aerosol)

Aveeno Protect and Refresh (aerosol)

What in Benzene?  Benzene is a natural compound of crude oil, gasoline, and cigarette smoke and ranks in the top 20 chemicals used for production of lubricants, rubbers, dyes, detergents, drugs, pesticides, as well as plastic, resins and nylon and synthetic fibers according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  It is a colorless or light-yellow liquid with a sweet odor.  It is flammable and floats on water.

It is suspected that benzene was a contaminant that made its way into the sunscreen product during manufacturing.  Or it could be a byproduct of the process of making chemicals that companies use to formulate personal care products and sunscreens.

For more information on how SafeSourcing can help your procurement efforts, or on our Risk

Free trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.  We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

References

Sandra LaMotte, CNN, 7/17/2021

Today’s post is by Troy Lowe; Vice President of Development at SafeSourcing.

If you haven’t noticed the price of just about everything has been going up over the past year or so.  Just recently another key inflation index rose significantly as the supply and demand mismatch continues.  The Producer Price Index, an economic measurement of the average change in prices that domestic producers of goods receive for their products in a given country, rose almost 8 percent over the last 12 months.  With everything going up, it is time to start thinking about where and how you can save money.  One way to do this is to cut down on your grocery budget.  According to researchers, the average household family of four is spending over 900 dollars a month.  That comes out to almost 11,000 dollars a year.  There are many ways to cut spending on groceries.  One way is to price compare before you shop by comparing prices using grocery store apps.  You can use the apps to browse their weekly ads and to download digital coupons.  When you go through the checkout and use you reward card the coupons are automatically taken off when the items are purchased.  Below are some other tips to help you save money during these trying times.

• Get rid of Debt
• Buy Generic
• Use Coupons and Cash Back Apps
• Buy in Bulk
• Shop Online
• Get rid of Cable Television
• Cancel automatic subscription services you’re not using
• Reduce Energy Costs
• Pack your Lunch
• Make your own Coffee
• Set up your Bank accounts to automatically transfer money from Checking to Savings

Interested in learning how SafeSourcing can help your company run more efficiently?  If you would like more information on how SafeSourcing can help your procurement efforts, or on our Risk Free trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.  We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

Today’s re-post is by Dave Wenig, Senior Vice President of Sales and Services at SafeSourcing.

At SafeSourcing, we’re always focused on expenses. Helping our customers manage their expenses and reduce costs is in our DNA. It’s fair to say that nearly every organization we work with also has some degree of their focus placed on expense management too. The degree to which this is true varies, but expenses are usually an area of at least some focus.

These days, the level of focus on expense management and reduction seems to be higher. At least, that’s what we are hearing. We hear several times a day from many organizations that they are really focused on expenses right now. But what does that mean and what are you actually doing about it?

There are certainly many ways that one might decide tackle expense reduction. There are some very severe measures like furloughs and layoffs that, while effective in reducing expenses, have some other wide-reaching negative side effects on your business. There are some more temporary measures that can be taken such as freezing spending in certain areas. This can also be effective in the near-term, but this too has negative consequences.

In these times, measures such as these are being considered and implemented regularly. We see it in the news and we hear it in conversation.

There is another way to manage and reduce expenses, of course. Our readers already know that SafeSourcing reduces costs for our customers while maintaining current specifications and service levels and the cost reductions are not temporary. On average, we deliver over 24% cost reduction across all spend categories. That means that if you work with SafeSourcing to reduce your expenses, the reduction scales as you go. If you source $100,000 using our services, your new expense may be around $75,000 after working with us. If you source $10,000,000 using our services, your new expenses may be around $7,500,000.

Plus, working with SafeSourcing also means you get to hand off the hard work of finding vendors and negotiating new rates which can be very time consuming, especially if you’ve already reduced headcount.

I thought it was a good time to share a reminder that there are options if expense reduction is your new priority.

What does “reducing expenses” mean to you?

If you would like more information on how SafeSourcing can help you, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service representative.  We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

Today’s post is by Troy Lowe; Vice President of Development at SafeSourcing Inc.

I recently started working on a new tool that our team will be using to show our prospective clients and current clients how much savings that we at SafeSourcing can offer them.  While working on this tool, it reminded me of when I first started with the company years ago.  I was watching one of our RFQs that was running for one of our clients and was amazed that they received pricing that was more than 20 percent less than what they were currently paying.  My first question to one of my colleagues was, why are they paying so much?  And then my next question was, why doesn’t everyone do this?  Running an RFQ cannot only save you money on current products or services that you purchase but can also help in cost avoidance.  If you have current contracts ending soon, it is very possible that you will see those prices rising.  Running an RFQ with us could help you to avoid having to incur costs in the future.  If you would like to learn more about cost avoidance, take time to review data from a recent SafeSourcing BLOG.

Below are some of the RFQs that we have recently run for our customers to help them lower their expenses.

1. Vehicle Leases
2. Fleet Purchase or Lease
3. Fleet Repair and Maintenance
4. Diesel Fueling Program
5. Plastic Supply Items
6. Plastic Bags
7. Paper Bags
8. Lids and Straws
9. Pest Control
10. Office Supplies
11. Cleaning Supplies
12. Liquid and Foam Sanitizer
13. Waste Removal
14. Propane Exchange
15. Uniforms
16. Receipt Paper
17. Bottled Water

Interested in learning how SafeSourcing can help your company save money and run more efficiently?  If you would like more information on how SafeSourcing can help your procurement efforts, or on our Risk Free trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.  We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

Todays post is from Ron Southard, CEO at SafeSourcing Inc.

What type of System and Organization Controls do you have in place for your company and or your service providers or both? You should probably have both and there are two important types; SOC 1 and SOC 2 (pronounced Sock)

According to Google: Typically, a SOC 1 report is designed to address internal controls over financial reporting while a SOC 2 report addresses a service organization’s controls that are relevant to their operations and compliance. One or both could be right for your organization. In my estimation you should have both with SOC 2 being critical for organizations that provide cloud services for you.

What does SOC 2 compliance mean?

According to Google, SOC 2 is an auditing procedure that ensures your service providers securely manage your data to protect the interests of your organization and the privacy of its clients. For security-conscious businesses, SOC 2 compliance is a minimal requirement when considering a SaaS provider.

The SafeSourceIt™ family of eProcurement solutions are SOC 2 compliant, so that our customers do not have to worry about their data and can focus on the important task of sourcing the best products and services at the best price at the right time to support their customers.

If you would like to learn more about SafeSourcing, please reach out to one of our very talented customer services account managers.

Today’s post is by Dave Wenig, Senior Vice President of Sales and Services at SafeSourcing, Inc.

What is the difference between an excuse and a reason? Certainly, anyone could find the definition for each and understand better. For reference, here is what Dictionary.com lists as the definition for excuse and reason.

• Excuse: an explanation offered as a reason for being excused; a plea offered in extenuation of       a fault or for release from an obligation, promise, etc.
• Reason: a basis or cause, as for some belief, action, fact, event, etc.

At SafeSourcing we have encountered many excuses and reasons from a variety of sources. We hear both from our vendor partners every single day in regard to the invitations we extend to them to submit proposals during our eRFx Events on behalf of our customers. This is not a negative statement, but simply an observation. What is interesting about excuses and reasons is that can both have the same effect.

The excuses and reasons vary fairly widely. Let’s look at a few examples in an effort to understand them.

One reason we might find that a vendor we have invited to quote on our customer’s business is that they do not have the capacity at the present to provide the products or services at the scale that the customer requires. This is a reason because it is based on facts. This reason is perfectly understandable. Another reason a vendor might list for declining our invitation is their inability to provide pricing at competitive rates. Perhaps their own supply chain does not allow for the appropriate level of discount that our customer requires. Again, this is a reason why a vendor cannot participate in an eRFx Event.

Excuses can tend to be a little hazy and difficult to support by facts as reasons can. One example of an excuse we might hear in response to our invitation to participate in an eRFx Event is the lack of time. A vendor representative might offer their travel schedule as their excuse for declining noting that they do not have time at present. While it’s possible that time restraints exist, in most cases, this can be worked out so that the vendor can still participate. Another example of an excuse may be found in the vendor’s personal preferences. The vendor might prefer to work directly with the customer to develop a proposal. This excuse is fairly transparent in that they would prefer not to participate competitively in an eRFx Event, but rather deal directly and exclusively with the customer. It’s easy to imagine why this would be beneficial to the vendor, but it’s more difficult to see how this benefits the customer.

These are only a handful of examples of excuses and reasons, but they illustrate that there is a difference between the two and that they are not equal in status. Vendors aren’t the only parties that have reasons and excuses, of course. Sometimes our customers have reasons why they choose not to use eRFx Events for their sourcing even though to do so with SafeSourcing has historically caused savings in excess of 24%. Some reasons are perfectly understandable such as when the customer is in an existing contract that currently prevents their use of our services. Some excuses are just that like when a customer prefers to do business with a certain vendor because that vendor has “been a good partner” to them over the years. This statement may be true, but tends to be more of an explanation than a basis.

At SafeSourcing, we always encourage our vendor partners and our customers to consider carefully the decisions they make. We understand reasons, but we respectfully challenge excuses to the benefit of all parties involved.

Contact SafeSourcing, Inc. if you’re interested in learning more about how RFQ Events can help your company advance the bases and achieve savings.

References:

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/reasony

https://www.dictionary.com/browse/excuse?s=t

Today’s blog is by Gayl Southard, Vice President of Administrative at SafeSourcing.

After a year of promoting chicken sandwiches and wings, many restaurants such as Buffalo Wild Wings, KFC, and Wingstop are paying much more for poultry.  Some restaurants are running out of chicken or limiting the amount of tenders, fillets, and wings sold.  Some independent eateries and bars have gone weeks without wings.  The price of chicken breasts have more than doubled since the beginning of the year, and wing prices have hit record highs, according to Urner Barry, a market research firm.  Wingstop reported they are paying 26% more for bone-in wings this year.  One of the problems with the poultry industry is getting employees to work.  The lack of workers is affecting many industries.

At the beginning of 2021, chicken looked like a bargain for US restaurants.  Closures of dining rooms had contributed to the stockpile of chicken in cold-storage facilities.  Boneless, skinless breasts averaged $1 a pound last year.  Today, the same product is $2.04 a pound.  Over the past decade the average price was $1.32 a pound.  This is a huge increase!

The chicken sandwich wars in fast food chains have also contributed to increased prices.  Companies such as McDonalds, Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen, Inc., and Wendy’s introduced new crispy chicken offerings.  Chicken sandwiches have always been a better dollar value, especially for families.  The biggest problem for supermarket, fast food chains, and restaurants is keeping up with the demand.  A KFC spokesperson reported that they look forward to getting back to normal once the short supplies ease.

Chicken-wing prices have risen to $2.92 a pound. Fast food restaurants serving wings grew 33% in the past 12 months, ending in March 2021, compared to the previous year.  For chicken producers, the restaurants growing poultry appetite is driving a windfall and offsetting the higher grain prices.

For more information on how SafeSourcing can help your procurement efforts, or on our Risk

Free trial program, please contact a SafeSourcing Customer Service Representative.  We have an entire team ready to assist you today.

References———–

Heather Haddon and Jacob Bunge, WSJ, 5/7/2021