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When shopping personally, many people seek ways to save money. They may use coupons, compare vendors’ prices or buy in bulk to receive discounts.
The military also looks for ways to save money while shopping, and the Joint Office Supplies in Europe program, referred to as JOSE, has the capability to possibly save the Department of Defense more than $1 million per year.
This is expected to happen as the program aims to revamp how U.S. Air Forces in Europe’s and U.S. Army in Europe’s Government Purchase Card cardholders buy office supplies without taking advantage of discounts.
The idea for the program’s creation began when service component contracting offices reviewed the fiscal year 2014 office supply purchases.
“The services executed repetitive office supply purchases without receiving any discount,” said Marianne Seufert, Air Force Installation Contracting Activity and USAFE Strategic Sourcing Chief.
During the past year, the 1,600 GPC cardholders in USAFE bought office supplies from more than 400 different vendors, effectively negating any benefits that would normally come from bulk purchases.
According to Peter Deibert, 409th Contracting Support Brigade procurement analyst and acquisition planner, USAREUR’s approximate 900 GPCs were similarly spread out, making more than 9,000 purchases through 380 vendors.
After looking at their numbers, both organizations realized they spent approximately $13 million over nearly 20,000 purchases, again with no discount realized because of the lack of buying power leverage.
With approval from U.S. Air Force Col. Ronnie Doud, AFICA director, and Paul Michaels, 409th CSB, a joint team studied the potential benefits of a European-wide contract to buy office supplies.
“We advertised to global industry and invited business partners to an Industry Day at Ramstein Air Base,” Seufert said. “We need an acquisition solution at the strategic level in Europe.”
At the event, the joint team gathered information from the industry experts to determine how to combine customer needs, organizational goals and market conditions to get the best product and service at the best value.
From the information gathered, the team planned a future strategy to move both USAFE and USAREUR from buying tactically to strategically, which formed the foundation of JOSE.
The new concept provides online ordering at discounted prices and delivery within three business days directly to the customer.
Since the new method of purchasing office supplies will be different from what has been done before, the GPC programs are scheduled to inform cardholders by email once JOSE is fully running, and tailor training to instruct cardholders on the new process.
The Strategic Sourcing team expects the contract to be awarded in March and companies to have their websites tailored to the JOSE program by May.
