Supplier Partnerships Lead the Way
A few years ago, I asked a buyer from a large high-tech company, “Do you use supplier partnerships as part of your purchasing approach?” She responded, “Of course,” as if partnerships were an obvious aspect of purchasing. When I asked, “What do those partnerships look like?” she replied, “If the supplier provides the price, quality and lead time we want, they can be our partner.” I asked how their suppliers feel about that, and she answered, “It doesn’t matter. There are plenty out there that want to do business with us.”
A recent example of this type of vendor relationship is Amazon.com, which accounts for 65 percent of e-book sales in the United States,1 and its demands that publisher Hachette reduce ...
Get 1+1 = 100 now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
