Harnessing the Power of Supplier Relationships
Planners and suppliers can leverage their business relationships into long-term partnerships that deliver value, cut costs, and improve efficiencies for all concerned, according to participants in a Sunday morning session on harnessing the power of supplier relationships.
Betsy Bondurant, CMP, CMM, principal of Bondurant Consulting, invited participants to share successes and failures from their efforts to work more collaboratively in tough economic times.
A participant recalled a vendor who tried to charge $2,000 for presenting a verbal proposal, after the RFP was cancelled due to economic restraint. The planner refused the payment, and the vendor wasn’t invited back to bid on future business.
But for every example of bad practice, the group had strategic insights to share. A number of suppliers talked about multi-year partnerships that enabled them to offer significant discounts, while saving their planner clients the trouble of explaining a complex project to a new vendor every year.
One hotelier described a particularly complicated project where each of four divisional vice presidents expected a separate, visible presence at a company-wide meeting, while the CEO wanted to deliver an integrated message to the entire company. The solution was to locate the meeting at four hotels within a single brand, so that the VPs received separate profile while the larger organization met together.
Once the hotel chain created the successful formula, it booked the same business five years in a row at different destinations.
Read Full Article
Back to Session Summaries