Over the past five years, PurchasePro.com has gone from existing as only a visionary dream to being the host of the world’s largest business-to-business marketplace. Before the company’s emergence onto the scene, speed in the marketplace was sorely lacking in a majority of industries. While many companies had considered e-procurement, it was too expensive and time-consuming to initiate. Integrating new software into supply chains was troublesome and costly.
The company’s founder, Charles Johnson, Jr., was already a successful entrepreneur with fifteen years of experience as a small business owner. Over the years he had witnessed firsthand the flaws in a paper-based purchasing system in today’s computer-saturated world. Although he had little technological experience, he believed that an Internet-based procurement system would create tremendous efficiency for many companies.
Research firms have shown, time and again, that the small business market is increasingly adopting e-commerce solutions. Online procurement systems were already in existence but focused exclusively on large Fortune 500 businesses. With all of this in mind, Johnson founded PurchasePro.com in 1996. From the beginning, the system was designed to be infinitely scalable in order to accommodate businesses of all sizes – from your local hardware store to mammoth hospitality corporations like MGM MIRAGE and Hilton Hotels Corporation.
With headquarters in Las Vegas, PurchasePro.com is located in one of the fastest growing areas in America. Early on, the company set its sights on the hospitality industry, which spends approximately $50-60 million per year on supplies and services. These large companies have purchasing needs which span many different industries, everything from security to food and beverage to janitorial and basic office supplies. Las Vegas was an ideal testing ground in which to develop its signature products. PurchasePro.com has since become the e-procurement standard for the hospitality industry.
PurchasePro.com Chief Executive Officer Richard Clemmer is enthusiastic and optimistic about potential opportunities for the company. “We have all the resources to achieve our primary objective of building great software that gives companies of all sizes universal access to the world’s largest commerce network.”
E-commerce has experienced explosive growth at all levels of business in many different types of industries. To that end, PurchasePro.com has created three e-commerce solutions for the most common customer buying and selling needs: e-MarketMaker, e-Procurement, and v-Distributor.
e-MarketMaker establishes a private online commerce community, allowing all participants to buy and sell within the proprietor’s custom-branded, real-time virtual marketplace. The community nature of this solution allows members to take advantage of better pricing, simplified product sourcing, streamed Request for Proposal (RFP) and Purchase Order (PO) processes and expanded product offerings. Transactions are conducted immediately and are automatically documented electronically.
The e-Procurement solution streamlines corporate procurement by connecting companies with their various suppliers, saving time and money by bringing the entire purchasing process under one virtual roof. Participants have complete control within this custom-built, uniquely branded e-marketplace.
Setting up an online distribution center is very simple with PurchasePro.com’s v-Distributor. With the creation of a private e-marketplace, customers establish custom-branded “storefronts,” leading to increased sales, improved customer service, and cost reduction caused by secure, instant and trackable transactions. Customers can automate the entire purchasing process online, without the cost of paper catalogs, by responding to changing markets in real time, instantly updating product mixes, changing pricing structures and streamlining the billing process.
PurchasePro.com has formed strategic relationships with such well-known companies as AOL Time Warner, Sprint, Gateway Computers, Office Depot and Hewlett-Packard. These relationships have led to the company’s status as a business to business leader in the mass market.
All of PurchasePro.com’s products are browser-based, eliminating the need for expensive infrastructure or costly up-front software investments. The company’s boundless trading environment, interoperable marketplaces and business are all connected, enhancing opportunities for both buyers and sellers.