Our Mission is to work together as a unified group of Distribution Centers to procure store equipment and services at levels equal to or better than our Big Box and Chain Store competitors.
Objectives:
The first objective of the Consortium is to use our combined equipment buying volume to negotiate, with a selected group of manufacturers, for the lowest possible cost on equipment and services for our collective "Member Stores". Each Consortium Member continues to order all equipment and service, payment of all invoices to the supplier/manufacturer, and will deal directly with each manufacturer representative.
The second objective is to negotiate any additional volume incentives any preferred supplier may offer based upon the Consortium's focused buying efforts.
The third objective is to continue to develop software that was started by Associated Food Stores, Salt Lake City, specifically for Store Development/Store Engineering Departments. This software is divided in to two parts, FoxPro Accounting Software and Additions to AutoCAD 2002.
Consortium Information:
Consortium geography includes the majority of the Continental United States, Hawaii and other parts of the world.
Group buying power: Ten Independent, Retailer Owned Distribution Companies supplying over 6200 retail outlets with combined retail sales in excess of Eighteen (18) Billion Dollars.
Consortium History: In 1998 the idea was formulated to develop a group of independent warehouses working together to facilitate discussions about equipment purchasing and the Store Development/Store Engineering industry.
The Store Development Consortium was born at the beginning of the "Twenty First Century", on January 4, 2000. The founding warehouses were: Associated Grocers-Seattle, URM Stores-Spokane, Affiliated Food Stores-Amarillo, and Associated Food Stores-Salt Lake City. Membership has grown since that time to the current number of members.
