Strategic Sourcing

Typical school districts and universities have a vendor list that includes a business-to-business profile comprising thousands and thousands of companies. Which vendor gets what business and why?

A thorough review and understanding of agency spending patterns would reveal important clues on how to achieve long term savings including:

• the need for better contracts and standards
• the total cost of goods purchased
• how your existing prices benchmark against the Epylon Supplier Marketplace
• the optimum use of your district's vendor pool

As part of its counsel to school districts, colleges and universities, Epylon analyzes accounts payable data and makes recommendations on strategies that will yield price savings and workflow efficiencies. Epylon also assists districts and colleges in carrying out aggressive strategies for developing new purchasing contracts, creating purchasing standards, preventing maverick buying, negotiating with vendors, and overall contract management.

Epylon advises on how to lower the cost of doing daily business, shorten the buying cycle, reduce labor costs and achieve the best overall value on goods and services. Epylon's experienced sourcing staff has developed proven processes for consolidating spend and optimizing taxpayer dollars.

Epylon's strategic sourcing process consists of three phases:

• Strategy and diagnosis - collect data and develop a strategy and prioritization for each commodity type where cost savings can be achieved and sustained
• Vendor assessment and negotiation - evaluate vendors for price and performance, issue RFPs, and negotiate aggregated spend contracts in order to optimize the supplier base
• Implementation - develop a process to continually track supplier performance and ensure that full value is achieve

For more information on how Epylon's strategic sourcing services can increase your agency's efficiency and provide long-term savings, please contact K12info@epylon.com.