Most organizations lack independent data on whether their vendor pricing is competitive. Without benchmarking against what peers pay for comparable services, pricing drift goes undetected for years — silently eroding margins year after year.
Vendor pricing drift doesn't happen because anyone is negligent — it happens because the incentives in procurement are structurally misaligned with ongoing price optimization. The team that negotiates a contract is rarely the same team that processes invoices years later. Initial competitive bids create strong starting prices, but over time, several forces push prices upward:
Annual escalators compound year over year, even as market rates for the underlying service decline. Incumbent vendors count on organizational inertia — the fact that switching costs, real or perceived, make re-bidding feel like more trouble than it's worth. And without independent market data, procurement teams lack the leverage to challenge a vendor's assertion that "this is the market rate."
The result: organizations routinely pay 10% to 30% above market for commodity services — IT support, telecom, waste management, uniform services, office supplies, facility maintenance, and dozens of other recurring spend categories — simply because no one has checked in years.
Circuit costs have declined substantially over the past decade, but legacy contracts often lock in rates from years ago. Benchmarking consistently identifies 20-40% savings.
Pricing models have evolved rapidly. Organizations on older per-device or block-hour models often pay significantly more than modern per-user or consumption-based alternatives.
Highly localized markets with wide pricing dispersion. Organizations with multiple locations rarely benchmark each site individually, leaving significant savings untapped.
Commodity categories where pricing discipline degrades quickly. Incumbent suppliers often stop competing on price once they've secured the account.
Carrier pricing fluctuates significantly with market conditions. Organizations locked into annual contracts often miss opportunities to capture declining spot rates.
Blackspire Advisors brings an independent, data-driven approach to vendor benchmarking. Unlike software platforms that rely solely on self-reported data, we combine market intelligence, competitive analysis frameworks, and hands-on procurement expertise to assess whether your vendor pricing is truly competitive.
We organize all vendor spend into benchmarkable categories and establish current pricing baselines from contracts, invoices, and statements.
For each category, we assess whether current pricing falls within competitive market ranges using multiple data sources — including anonymized transaction data, RFP results, and industry pricing studies.
We rank opportunities by estimated savings, ease of implementation, and contract timing — identifying the highest-impact items to address first.
We provide the market data and negotiation frameworks your team needs to approach vendors with confidence — or, if preferred, we can facilitate the renegotiation directly.
For our top 20 vendors by spend, when was the last time we independently verified that their pricing is competitive with current market rates?
How many of our recurring vendor contracts include automatic annual escalators — and when did we last challenge those escalators?
Do we have contracts where the incumbent has held the business for 5+ years without a competitive re-bid?
For multi-location operations, are we benchmarking vendor pricing at each individual site — or assuming enterprise contracts deliver the best rates everywhere?
Independent vendor benchmarking gives your procurement team the data and leverage they need to negotiate from a position of strength. Blackspire Advisors helps you identify where pricing has drifted — and what to do about it.
Schedule a Vendor Spend Review