Not a new independent buying group…

It is the long history of humankind…that those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed

Once upon a time, there were three independent builders merchant companies with different histories, different ownership models, and different geographical heartlands. They also had some similarities: all have built their reputations on relationships with customers forged over decades. Relationships with suppliers that they built on trust rather than transactions. Relationships with communities where local knowledge can prove more valuable an asset than sheer size.

All three – Bradfords, JT Atkinson and Lords – have at their hearts, a commitment to serving their customers, to playing fair by their suppliers, to developing their employees, and to growing their companies.

Businesses do grow, even at the moment. As they do so, their needs change. The way they manage their employees, their premises, their transport, their accounts, and, yes, their procurement arrangements.

This industry does have a rather esoteric idea of what constitutes a secret, so it wasn’t much of a surprise when Bradfords and Lords announced their decision to leave the h&b buying group they had been a part of for some years. Equally, the decision of JT Atkinson to leave  Fortis may have caught off-guard some who aren’t quite as attuned to the jungle drums as others.

What isn’t a surprise is the fact that, despite the differences I’ve outlined above, all three of these businesses have found that their common aims could be put to good use.

I must stress that the industry does NOT have a new buying group as of this week. What it does have is a new collaborative procurement model that combines the buying strength of three substantial independent businesses while allowing each to remain entirely independent. It’s a collaboration between like-minded, similar businesses, who want to pool their buying requirements where doing so can best add value. And that value has to be for the suppliers as much as the merchants themselves. If it works for the merchants but not the suppliers then it doesn’t work at all. And something that works for suppliers and merchants will, ultimately work for customers.

It’s less about combining the, admittedly considerable, buying power of Bradfords, JT Atkinson and Lords than it is about combining commitment. Now more than ever, suppliers deserve certainty and commitment from their customers. Nor is it about creating more bureaucracy, or another layer of management and management costs. With Keith Wright acting as Alliance Procurement Director, the model otherwise operates through the existing teams and infrastructure of the three businesses. There’ll be no central rebate collection, everything will be done through the existing businesses, with terms agreed by the Alliance as a framework.

The Alliance wasn’t formed to try and batter down suppliers on prices, and this wasn’t the end goal when all three left their respective buying groups. Rather, like so many initiatives in this sector, it happened via conversation; an idea that sparked,  smouldered for a while, and was fanned into a full flame (probably not the most tactful metaphor at the moment) by a shared desire to build better businesses, where appropriate.

In the face of increasingly hostile headwinds, businesses have to do what they believe to be in their best interests in order to survive and prosper. It’s not a new buying group; it’s not seeking to replicate or replace what the buying groups do. The Alliance wants to occupy a different space, a space that isn’t just about buying better, but is about committing wholeheartedly to working with certain suppliers where value can be added to both partners and to both buying and selling.

As David Young put it – and it’s a phrase I wish I’d come up with first – “the promise that we want to give our suppliers, is that when we’re committed, we’re committed. We’re definitely the pig in the breakfast platter, not the chicken.”