Volume Rebates and Discounts
Refunds or discounts paid to management companies or group purchasing organizations from distributors and other vendors in exchange for securing a certain volume of sales.
Glossary
Terms are defined below to ease the use of the toolkit and support the process of implementing values-based purchasing practices.
Vendor Eligibility
The process of ensuring that vendors receive certification or approval to sell to the institution.
Values-based vendor
A vendor that meets an institution's food purchasing guidelines, standards, or values-based preferences and requirements
Values-based procurement
Aligning institutional purchasing with the institution's values.
Traditional vendor
The large-scale food distributors (broadline distributors), aggregators, and producers that have historically dominated institutional sales and markets. Examples of traditional vendors include Best Food, Sysco, Performance Food Group, U.S. Foods, Purdue, and Tyson.
Standing purchase order
A recurring purchase by an institution from a values-based vendor, typically of a set dollar amount of product quantity, made on a specified time interval.
Specifications
Product standards and vendor eligibility requirements included in a solicitation, such as a request for proposals or an invitation for bids.
Small purchase
Also called a "simplified acquisition," small purchases require less formality than a formal solicitation, but more than a micro-purchase. Under federal law, small purchases are those between $10,000 and $250,000, and they require institutions to acquire bids from multiple qualified sources, but they allow for consideration of cost and other factors.
Single purchase order
Stand-alone purchases by an institution from a values-based vendor that enable institutions to make values-based purchases without having to make long-term commitments.
RFP (Request for Proposals)
A type of formal solicitation that allows for consideration of evaluation metrics beyond lowest cost.
Public institution
Institutions receiving government funding to support their food service operations.
Producers
“Producers” is used as an umbrella term to include farmers, growers, ranchers, product makers, and others contributing products in values-based procurement. This Toolkit uses the term “producer” to refer to entities whom an institution may purchase from directly or through an aggregator or distributor.