What is Cooperative Purchasing?
It is a procurement tool that allows for public agencies and nonprofits to utilize awarded contracts that have already gone through a solicitation process.
Are Cooperative Contracts Legal?
Public sector agencies and nonprofits across the county (including cities, counties, states, K-12 schools, colleges, universities, and special districts) have utilized cooperative contracts for years. Each state has joint powers authority statutes that dictate their ability to utilize cooperative contracts. In fact, 94% of the US population is represented by OMNIA Partners membership.
Why do Public Agencies and Nonprofits Use Cooperative Contracts?
Cooperative contracts, also referred to as Master Agreements, are utilized to save time, save resources, improve efficiencies, higher-quality products and services, and save money due to the buying power of cooperative contracts. As the pioneer of the lead agency model over 25 years ago, OMNIA Partners knows what agencies need. The work of the solicitation process has been completed for public agencies looking to use a Master Agreement: a Lead Public Agency has already conducted an open and competitive procurement process.
The Lead Public Agencies reflect a wide variety of agency types including cities, counties, states, K-12 schools, universities, and other special districts located across the country that not only are well respected and highly regarded in their region, but they also reflect the diverse range of Participating Public Agencies that utilize the resulting Master Agreements. All Participating Public Agencies follow a standard and widely accepted solicitation process utilizing best practices. All process and contract documents are made available on the OMNIA Partners site with no log-in needed.
What Makes OMNIA Partners Different?
On top of our years of experience in the industry, OMNIA Partners has the added value of a large availability of solutions, best-in-class suppliers, and vast resources for members.
Our resources include sophisticated technology, such as OPUS and data analytics, and different teams of dedicated tangible professionals. Our Regional Managers act as a single point of contact for public agencies to have easy access to someone when they need it.
We also have a team of certified public procurement contract managers with decades of experience as public procurement practitioners. Our public sector contracting team supports the contracts in the portfolio and often help answer in-depth procurement and contract questions.
Lead Agency Cooperative Contracting Process
Competitive Solicitations Awarded by a Lead Public Agency Delivering Compliant Master Agreements.
All cooperative Master Agreements offered through OMNIA Partners have been awarded through a competitive solicitation, typically a Request for Proposal (RFP), by a public agency/governmental entity (e.g. state, city, county, public university, or school district). The Lead Public Agency cooperative contracting process is the foundation of OMNIA Partners and sets us apart from other cooperatives. For even the most restrictive agencies nationwide to realize the best value offered by cooperative purchasing, OMNIA Partners ensures that industry best practices, processes, and procedures are applied.
Competitive Solicitation Process
- The Lead Public Agency prepares the competitive solicitation while incorporating language to make the resulting Master Agreement accessible nationally to other public agencies through OMNIA Partners, Public Sector.
- The Lead Public Agency issues the solicitation, holds any pre-proposals or site visits, and issues any required amendments or notifications.
- Interested suppliers respond to the solicitation through the open competitive process.
- The Lead Public Agency evaluates the responses, negotiates the final terms and conditions, and ultimately awards the cooperative Master Agreement.
- The Master Agreement is available for public agencies, educational institutions, and nonprofits nationwide. This is commonly referred to as ‘piggybacking’ the contract.
