Client Facts, Case Studies, and 100% Performance: What Would Your Company Do with Extra Cash Flow?

Who is Above the Standard? What can we do for you?

Above the Standard is a leader in helping companies, schools, non-profits, and governments reduce what they pay for the products and services they already buy. Our market continues to become ever more prominent and topical due to the cost cutting and the growing need for companies, cities, schools, and not for profits to reduce their costs from the last ten years, the global economy, raw materials demand, global competition, job outsourcing, and many other factors.

Above the Standard is founded on more than a 30-year successful track record. We have helped the Federal Government and many small to large companies reduce costs in the tens of billions of dollars.

A growing number of companies are also looking to reduce what they spend on goods and services. Unfortunately, the reality is that many smaller to mid-sized companies and organizations have no purchasing department, have a small purchasing group, or have reduced their procurement staff to where the remaining personnel struggle to perform even basic purchasing functions. This means most companies simply do not have the time, personnel, or resources to write purchasing Request for Proposals (RFPs), obtain multiple bids, and evaluate the myriad of competing vendor options, claims, and exaggerated promises. For these and other reasons, tens of thousands of smaller to mid-size enterprises end up “making do” with the old suppliers and vendors. Too often, this results in paying more, questionable product quality, late deliveries, poor customer service, and less than ideal payment terms.

The Solution

The benefits of working with an outside procurement reduction partner are many and real: Reduced costs; Increased quality; Improved supplier monitoring and performance; Better procurement performance without increasing procurement headcount, salaries, and benefits; Greater government compliance; Improved standardization; Customer service; and Improved competitiveness.

Today, most existing procurement cost reduction firm’s fall into two categories:

? Giant firms like IBM, GE, and Accenture whose rates are well beyond the budgets of most companies.

? Small mom and pop companies who generally lack the appropriate level of experience, systems, and expertise, and/or who may specialize in just one cost reduction area such as telecom or energy.

Above the Standard is one of the leading procurement cost reduction experts and business growth services companies. We have the experience, connections, and a supplier network to lower your costs on virtually any product and/or service your company is currently buying.

We are so confident in our ability to save our clients’ money; we typically bill our services on a pure performance basis. If you don’t save money on the same or better-quality product or service, you don’t owe us one penny!

Above the Standard Can Lower Costs on Virtually any Product and Service

Above the Standard’s procurement cost reduction principles and strategies have helped reduce costs on just about every type of product and service imaginable, including: computers, human resources, IT, software, office supplies, green related products, cleaning, janitorial, leases, real estate, timber, MRO, heavy equipment, filters, plastics, steel, high temperature application materials, oil, lubes, fuel, financial, credit cards, shipping, linens, uniforms, sheets, programming, procurement systems, dental, hospital equipment, educational supplies and equipment, furniture, machinery, fleets and vehicles, cement, asphalt, trucks, explosives, landscaping, food, food equipment and supplies, auditing services, professional services, consultants, and many other areas.

Testimonials

You can view what some of our clients have to say about us at: https://www.abovethestandard.net/testimonials.

Detailed Client Work

Medium Sized Organization: YWCA of Greater Los Angeles Client Summary

We have worked with the YWCA of Greater Los Angeles (YWCA GLA) since July 2007. The difference that they bring to the Greater Los Angeles area, by touching more than 100,000 individual lives each month through their different social programs, exceeds any monetary amount that our company is compensated.

What does the YWCA of Greater Los Angeles have to say about us?

“Above the Standard is the premiere go-to company for cost savings, efficiency and training! Ted Landgraf and Company have worked beyond expectation with the YWCA Greater Los Angeles on various tasks in procurement, finance, and administration. Above the Standard has the highest level of integrity and professionalism and I am pleased to recommend them to anyone looking for a better way of managing.” (Elsa Luna).

What are some of the areas Above the Standard has achieved for the YWCA GLA?

? Procurement cost reduction for many areas.

? Government compliance work.

? Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) improvement for greater efficiency.

? Federal Government Proposal Development/RFP to the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) National Office of Job Corps.

? Budget Management Proposal planning.

? Community Development Linkages.

? Cost Reduction for soft areas (invoicing, efficiencies, approval processes, software usage, communications, meeting procedures, and other measurable areas).

? Procurement training.

? And other finance and procurement areas.

Procurement Request for Proposals/Bids Conducted

? Electricity (in process).

? Office Supplies.

? Janitorial.

? Cleaning Supplies.

? Cell Phones.

? Copiers.

? Accelerograph (earthquake measurement equipment).

? Access Control System and Computer Software.

? Electrical.

? Fire Alarm System.

? Security System.

? Doors & Hardware.

? Elevators.

? Fire Extinguishers.

? Fire Protection.

? Food Service Equipment.

? Grease Interceptor.

? HVAC.

? Landscaping / Irrigation.

? Plumbing.

? Roof.

? Storm Drainage System - Pump Vendor.

? Trash & Recycling Service Provider.

? Trash Compactor.

? Window Washing Equipment.

? Window Washing Service.

? Other goods and services.

The savings and profit increase delivered and on-going are in the millions.

Other YWCA of Greater Los Angeles Specialized Projects

? We have been working with their New Urban Campus Building for transition procurements from an old facility. This building is a $70 Million+ Building Project in the heart of Los Angeles, right next to Staples Center.

? This new facility will be the home for hundreds of at-risk youth from the ages of 16-24 years of age. This building will provide vocational training, education, housing, food, and a way of life that provides this generation hope for a better future.

? Helped them win their Los Angeles Job Corps Center Contract term.

? Corporate contract, agreement, subcontract, and procurement development.

? Procurement compliance.

Small-Mid Sized Company Procurement Cost Reduction Details: One Project – One Client - $153,000+ Savings / Year – Office Supplies, Toner, & Paper

What can you expect when you partner with us?

Above the Standard conduct’s procurement cost reductions which is more quantifiable, detailed, performance driven, and measurable than expense cost reduction. We work in the details which is critical for maintaining cost reduction that is quantifiable for a contract term.

To illustrate what we practice with all procurement cost reduction Request for Proposals (RFPs) / Bids, below is a procurement cost reduction office supplies RFP Case Study that we conducted for one of our clients.

What is in it for YOU?

As we outlined what our client had, what our client needed, and the outcome from Above the Standard, please keep in mind that we have not included all areas because we want to keep this Case Study short yet provide you enough information to visualize the BEFORE and the AFTER so that you can see “What is in it for YOU?”. In other words, because we have had 100% cost reduction in every procurement cost reduction project over the years, we are confident that we can most likely do the same for you!

Before Project

Some of the details involved in this procurement cost reduction were:

? Almost 1,000 office supply items were purchased annually by our client.

? Our client was purchasing from more than 20 different vendors (more cost for invoice management, ordering, receiving, payment, etc.).

? Most purchases were conducted offline (not automated).

? The client had corporate offices and different locations in different states (no centralization).

? Lack of compliance and control.

? There was no monitoring of the type of items purchased.

? Bids and quotes were gathered at each location weekly for amounts above $3,000, which meant hundreds of bids were conducted annually for office supplies.

? No contract for this area of spend in the hundreds of thousands of dollars.

? No benchmarks to measure and rate the vendors.

? No oversight over these office supply vendors.

? There were no corporate approval measures for monitoring costs.

? There was no green program and no recycling of certain items.

? There was no online tracking.

? Invoicing and billing from vendors (some vendors were paid more than once, invoices were sent to the shipping location instead of the corporate office, and a host of other finance billing problems).

? There was no integration of their finance, purchasing, receiving, and warehousing for office supplies management.

? Unacceptable term payments on certain items.

? There was no master list of office supplies, toner, paper, and related items.

? They had delivery problems (back orders, having to wait too long for items, etc.);

After Project

What did Above the Standard do?

? We conducted our no cost assessment over the phone with this prospective client.

? Our confidentiality agreement was signed by Above the Standard and our prospective client.

? We provided solutions to our prospective client – some areas that we believed we could reduce their costs and help them improve in other areas.

? Our client selected some procurement cost reduction projects.

? We started with office supplies as our first project.

? We created a Scope of Work (SOW) for our client outlining their needs.

? This SOW provided specifications for the following (be able to order and have items shipped within 24 hours in most cases; cost reduction; compliance; Green program; select one vendor / supplier instead of more than 20; online ordering; better term payments; item control; online list; audit of prices; no back order; better Return Manufacturer Authorization; dedicated vendor finance invoicing specialist; dedicated sales and customer support people for each area; quarterly analysis and review for cost reduction of generic brands for brand named items; order from any of their locations throughout the U.S.; and a host of other areas).

? We assembled the master list of office supplies, toner, paper, and related items from the more than 20 vendors, thus creating a benchmark of items, a history, current pricing, trends, etc.

? We utilized this in our RFP package (contains multiple documents for a step-by-step, easy to follow process).

? From this, we not only compared pricing for each item, we reduced hard costs by 45% for the contract, and we were able to get all that they requested from their SOW included in our RFP process.

Result: A procurement cost reduction of 45% with annual savings of $153,508

Keep in mind that this is only one of many other procurement cost reduction projects we have conducted for this one client.

Large Company Outcome Example

One large company example, with annual revenues of more than $5 billion U.S., had cost over runs, budget problems, compliance issues, very little communication, and supply problems. With 252 purchasing personnel across their entire operations and more than $1 billion per year spend for goods and services, their procurement outsourcing had a lot of potential opportunity for procurement outsourcing.

What was the outcome?

Centralized procurement, better communications, increased production at each location, cost reduction of more than $50 million per year within two years, staff focus for core competencies, expansion of certain areas, closing of other areas that were a drain on the company’s resources, and streamlined purchasing personnel across the U.S. for greater outcomes in all areas of each region.

The first graph below shows the cycle of this company and the second graph below shows the beginning staff amount and labor costs with the ending staff and labor cost reduction after procurement outsourcing took place.

Large Company – Other Areas Conducted

Many other areas were conducted for this large multi-billion-dollar organization, such as:

? Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) centralization.

? Centralized procurement.

? Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX) compliance.

? JD Edwards improvement.

? Enhanced communications between the corporate shared services office and each plant / operations facility.

? Productivity increased.

? Payment cycle improved for vendors.

? Request for Proposal (RFP) standardization.

? Vendor management and compliance.

? Many other areas.

How Can We Serve You?

?Above the Standard

"Increase Profits, Reduce Cost"

Erwin Jack | [email protected] | AboveTheStandard.net

About Above the Standard

Above the Standard has global experience empowering and changing the lives for many executives, leaders, and organizations in more than 100 nations, having increased profits in the tens of billions of dollars, with sustainable outcomes.

Above the Standard is a dedicated and highly motivated leader and executive with more than 30 years global Business, Training, Strategic, Procurement, Finance, and Leadership experience in many different industries, from small to Fortune MNC’s.