Longwood University Leverages Cooperative Purchasing to Drive Efficiency and Savings

Longwood University is a public liberal arts university located in Farmville, Virginia. The university's Procurement Office, led by Procurement Director Ryan Ferebee, oversees day-to-day purchasing operations, contract management, supplier relationships, and warehouse functions. 

As a Virginia public institution of higher education with delegated authority and a VASCUPP (Virginia Association of State College and University Purchasing Professionals) member, Longwood is able to leverage cooperative contracts from national cooperatives like OMNIA Partners more readily and with greater flexibility than some other Virginia public entities.  

Like procurement teams across higher education, Longwood faced the familiar pressure of doing more with less. Supporting a wide range of institutional needs — from routine office supplies and facilities maintenance to complex capital projects — while managing time, resources, and staff capacity is no small task. Generating individual solicitations for every purchase category was time-consuming, and with a broad portfolio to manage, the team needed a smarter way to operate. 

Departments sourcing independently, duplicated efforts, and hours spent building solicitations from scratch were all standing between Longwood's procurement team and the strategic work they wanted to focus on. As Ferebee puts it: "I was out there searching to see if there was an existing contract for what we were looking for — a way to work a little smarter, not harder." This research led him to cooperative purchasing and OMNIA Partners. 

As a VASCUPP institution, Longwood gained greater access to national cooperative contracts — including those through OMNIA Partners — allowing the team to work more strategically across a wider range of spend categories. 

For Ferebee, the shift was significant. Rather than building every contract from the ground up, the team could identify existing cooperative contracts, confirm they met Longwood's needs, and move forward — saving time, reducing administrative burden, and delivering better value to the university. 

It starts with savings. Longwood has realized substantial savings in categories like office supplies and facilities through OMNIA Partners contracts. Competitive pricing and rebate programs have made cooperative purchasing a cornerstone of how the team manages spend — and Ferebee expects that value to grow as Longwood explores cooperative contracts in additional categories such as furniture. 

But, time savings may be even more powerful for the team. Managing a broad range of institutional purchasing needs means every efficiency counts. For Ferebee, cooperative contracts have been a game changer: "We don't have to recreate the wheel — there's already an established contract. It saves us time as far as man hours having to generate our own solicitation. We're all stretched thin, and we can use that time and effort toward other responsibilities." 

And the ease of use makes adoption simple. When Longwood brought on a cooperative contract for office supplies, implementation was straightforward — the contract was already awarded, the pricing was favorable, and a punch-out catalog made it easy for departments across campus to adopt. The result was a mandatory institution-wide solution that departments actually embraced. 

The bottom line? Cooperative purchasing isn't just a procurement tactic for Longwood — it's become a core part of how the university operates. Ferebee says, "That's one of the major purposes of our group (VASCUPP). To eliminate or reduce the hours used to prepare individual solicitations — but also to gain savings." 

Ferebee sees cooperative purchasing as a growing force in higher education procurement and anticipates broader adoption among peer institutions. He also sees Longwood continuing to expand its own use of cooperative contracts into new categories in the years ahead. 

On the horizon, Ferebee points to AI as an emerging tool for procurement teams, alongside continued growth in cooperative purchasing. "I see increased use of AI tools in procurement processes and an increase in partnerships with cooperatives," he says. "For those that are not using them, that's going to be a continued trend." 

For now, Longwood's partnership with OMNIA Partners reflects a procurement philosophy built on working smarter — finding the best existing tools, maximizing institutional resources, and delivering value across the university without unnecessary complexity.