Vow is a biotechnology organization on a mission to make sustainable food both irresistible and available to billions of people. Today, Vow is focused on entering the consumer market, launching cultured meat products to the world.
With the help of Ellen Dinsmoor, Head of Operations, and Maddie Williams, Office Manager, the fast-growing organization continues to scale their purchasing processes as quickly as they’ve been able to scale innovation in their industry.
The challenges
When Ellen Dinsmoor joined Vow, the team was experiencing exponential growth, both in terms of headcount and number of R&D activities in flight at any point in time. Dinsmoor knew that Vow’s operational processes needed to match the speed at which the R&D team was innovating. Having the equipment and supplies the scientists needed, and having them at their office at the right time, was essential to the success of their experiments.
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Maintaining purchasing visibility at scale: Vow’s original purchasing processes worked well when there were a handful of scientists, but they were not sustainable at scale. Scientists were having to consult multiple systems and the operations team to find out the status of their purchase requests.
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Disparate systems and burdensome processes: Managing requests, approvals, and POs across different systems can slow down the receipt of critical items. Office manager Maddie Williams was responsible for collecting requisitions, but Dinsmoor had sole access to the accounting system where POs were generated.
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An opportunity for stronger vendor relationships: Williams was also responsible for building and maintaining relationships with Vow’s vendors. Without a central system to manage purchase requests, she knew she was missing the opportunity to consolidate purchases and negotiate better rates.
The solution
Vow was looking for a system that was trusted in the biotechnology industry and could grow with their organization. After collecting feedback from team members and review sites, Dinsmoor chose Procurify.
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Increased purchasing visibility: With Procurify, Vow now has a central source of truth for all purchasing information, simplifying the PO creation process. Scientists, engineers, and “food inventors” are able to log into Procurify on desktop or mobile to check the status of their requests.
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Faster purchase cycle times: Today, Williams can easily find the information she needs to create a PO, enabling her to speed up the purchasing process considerably. When the orders arrive at Vow's lab, Williams notifies the scientists immediately using the Procurify mobile app.
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Stronger vendor relationships: With Procurify, Vow has maintained an impressive purchasing metric, with 80% of their spend going through less than 10% of their vendors. Real-time vendor insights allow them to negotiate better rates and discounts, and drive strategic discussions during monthly purchasing syncs.
Takeaways
The team at Vow has developed internal processes that allow them to quickly scale their team, maintain impressive purchasing metrics, and enter new markets without sacrificing speed or innovation. As Dinsmoor put it, “Procurify has given us a structure without limiting our speed. It’s given us more visibility into our purchasing so we can be thoughtful in our decisions while having controls in place.”
This delicate balance of speed and control is key to helping Vow fulfill their mission of feeding billions of people with more sustainable food. In Dinsmoor’s words: “We have to be smarter and quicker than anybody else out there to be able to overcome the challenges associated with our industry. If we get blocked, we can’t support this growth and learning.”
Learn how Procurify can help your organization innovate more quickly, without having to sacrifice control.
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Predictable workflows and centralized communication help improve the quality and speed of deployment for the products and services you need
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Leverage data to negotiate with preferred vendors and unlock savings
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Access real-time spend insights that help you optimize resource allocation and empower managers to understand the “why” behind every request
