Managing costs in a high-price era

摘要

The Handy & Harman Global Procurement Council has a game plan for 2005,and it's to retake the cost-control initiative lost to the 2004 price spike in raw materials.That's why supply management professionals gathered recently at corporate headquarters in Rye,N.Y.,to reinvigorate cost-reduction strategies that include cooperation commitments from suppliers that go beyond simple price-reduction efforts.Increasingly,economic realities-such as the 2004 price spike of steel commodities-are forcing companies to make purchasing more cost efficient."We have to buy better than the competition," says Bob Murphy,who heads the Handy & Harman purchasing council.