Vertis Communications, a charter member of Corporate United’s Mid-Atlantic office, is a premier provider of print advertising and direct marketing solutions to leading retail and consumer services companies. Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, the company has annual revenues of $1.4 billion and over one hundred locations in the United States, including 35 production facilities. Vertis was recently named a “Most Admired Company” by FORTUNE magazine.

United offered seemed like a tailor-made solution for Vertis.” Focusing on the concept of a GPO instead of the specific contracts, Mr. Hughes rallied the Vertis chain of command to become a member and start analyzing all the applicable categories.  In two years, Vertis has signed and implemented eight contracts: Asset Auctions, CentiMark, Choctaw-Kaul, Fastenal, FTD, Spectrum water, Volt, and Weichert office moves. Mr. Hughes and his staff are currently participating on the Member Sourcing Committees for electrical supplies, janitorial services and pallets. This remarkable level of participation is a first for any Corporate United member.

According to Mr. Hughes, the Choctaw-Kaul safety supplies contract has made a big impact for Vertis because it is a relatively significant spend category with a large number of sites participating on the contract and because the supplier is proactive in looking for opportunities to reduce costs on behalf of Vertis. The partnership with Choctaw-Kaul has resulted in standardizing safety products in all Vertis production facilities, as well as developing customized reports that are used to monitor contract compliance and identify rogue spend.

Participating on the Corporate United contracts represents the most valuable part of being a Corporate United member, says Mr. Hughes; it is the opportunity to reduce costs by joining existing contracts for any size spend category without having to do the up front work in house. He also values the chance to participate on a Member Sourcing Committee with a team of other member companies to guide future projects and aggregate the members’ purchasing power during negotiations. Mr. Hughes explains, “it is always a challenge with small spend categories to negotiate a good contract. But when you pool the purchase volume of multiple Corporate United members, you can achieve higher levels of savings.”  

Not only is pooling the spend of so many companies beneficial to Vertis, but so is the pool of knowledge and best practices that members have access to through networking events like SYNERGY and regional member meetings.  Outside of the value of cost savings, negotiating leverage and member networking, Mr. Hughes appreciates Corporate United’s proactive approach to being a resource. “They reach out to solicit member input for future direction, feedback on contracted suppliers, and participation on current decision-making.  That is when I really appreciate the value of our membership in Corporate United.”

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Corporate United extends a hearty thank you to Steve Hughes for offering his time and thoughts.  We are extremely pleased to have member companies like Vertis that are determined to take advantage of all that their membership has to offer.