Transport is essential for customer satisfaction, your turnover and your margin. Still, transport often does not get the attention it deserves. In our vision, transport should bring maximum value at reasonable costs. We call this "Transport Value Procurement". We use an integrated approach, assessing how transport impacts your operation and vice versa, including your sales, production, warehousing, finance, and customer service. We advice longer term partnerships with service providers, but with regular data-driven sanity checks. To us, availability, and analysis of data with proper tools is key to success in procurement and management.

On average a proper procurement project will take 3 months to complete from analyzing requirements to contract awarding. Naturally, the scope and size of the project will affect the duration. In some of the project phases the workload is high. Lack of time is the number one reason to postpone procurement projects. With our procurement service we do most of the work for you. Your own effort is very limited and focused on the main points to make the best decisions.

We can assist in the preparation of RFP documents, handle all communications with service providers, arrange non-disclosure agreements, create compliance documentation, etc. Additionally, we can gather all questions and bundle these in a Question-and-Answer document. We will reduce your time investment and ensure all the logistic service providers receive what they need to prepare a quote that matches your needs.

The most time-consuming phase is analyzing the received quotations. With our specialised tender software we will provide you detailed insight within just a few days.

Let us manage the complete tender process for you, while you focus on making informed decisions and enjoy the best possible results for your case.

Through interviews with all relevant stakeholders, we share our knowledge and define the required quality and service that your company needs. We translate the outcome in clear, concise, yet complete tender documentation (RFQ/RFP). Proper tender documentation will ensure that logistic service providers can properly quote to your needs. This prevents unexpected surprises after completion of your procurement project.

Through compliance questionnaire we ensure that quality and service are adequately taken into the equation in addition to costs. Completing your documentation with a representative shipment profile will enable the participants to match your shipments with their network, to ensure accurate quotations.

The goal of your procurement project is to find the best (mix) of logistic service provider(s) that can deliver your desired service and quality at reasonable costs. We always advise you to make choices that will lead to structural relationships, supported by a good and objective assessment of service versus costs. We recommend to include the current providers that you are satisfied with, and compare them with a limited set of new contenders.

Logistics service providers differ in their network, their specialties in volume (groupage, LTL, FTL) and destinations (country specialists versus EU wide coverage). The key to success is to find the best (mix) of logistic service provider(s) that match your desired in service and quality.

Tendering usually takes place on a multiannual frequency. Therefore, companies usually accumulate limited knowledge of the freight market and its service providers. For Transinnovate freight tendering and transport management (software) are continuous activities which ensures we always have current and relevant market knowledge.

Our tenders cover the European continent, all modalities, and many client branches like ambient transport, flowers, food, luxury goods, metal and chemicals. We do not have any agreements in place with logistic service providers and never receive commission. Therefore we can provide you completely independent support and advice about which service providers will match your company best.

The comparison of quotations received from your logistic service providers is complex and often a huge barrier towards making the best possible decisions. The quotations usually consist of large matrices with prices, divided in weight/volume and zip code zones. Often buyers create own pricing templates to reduce complexity. This is the most common pitfall during freight procurement, which always leads to higher costs.

Additionally, various surcharges may be applicable, such as the well-known fuel surcharge. It is crucial to compare apples with apples and translate the prices in the quotations received to costs, It is best to use a representative shipment profile for your company and take all surcharges into account.

Our own innovate tender software can easily analyze quotations in any form. We normally use shipment profiles with 12-months of shipments to include any seasonal influences. We translate rates to costs and analyze the impact of using different numbers of service providers. After receipt of our freight cost analysis, you are perfectly equipped to make informed decisions how to best organize your future transportation.

After you have decided which logistic service provider(s) to work with, it is time to formalize collaboration(s). One option is to work based on the general terms and conditions of your logistics partners. However, we recommend you to use at least “standard operating procedures” (SOP) or a service-level agreement (SLA). We can support you in completing these. If you prefer a legal contract, we will help you find the right legal partner.

Finally, we can also assist in the set-up of your transport management software or ERP with the new rates so that you can hit the ground running. If you do not have your own transport management software, we are happy to introduce our pragmatic and accessible TMS for managing and optimizing your freight activities and see if this fits your needs.