Collaborative sourcing activities a valuable experience for Hume health services

Health services in the Hume region participated in two collaborative sourcing activities in late 2024, resulting in significant cost savings.

Seven Hume health services including Beechworth Health Service, Mansfield District Hospital, Northeast Health Wangaratta (NHW), Tallangatta Health Service and Yarrawonga Health have benefitted from two group sourcing activities for laundry and linen services and fresh fruit and vegetables, both led by NHW.

The fresh fruit and vegetables tender coordinated by NHW, Goulburn Valley Health and Benalla Health was the first group tender conducted by health services in the region for this category.

NHW Chief Procurement Officer Kim Bennetts says working together enabled the group to achieve significant cost savings as well as business continuity benefits.

“We can help each other out if one of us has a shortfall in laundry and linen stock,” says Kim.

“It’s also helpful that we can performance manage contracts together. There are benefits to having more than one view about product quality and requirements,” she says.

The experience of leading the two sourcing activities has given the team at NHW valuable procurement experience.

“It’s helped to build the capability of my team – that’s been a really important benefit,” says Kim.

HSV Customer Relationship Manager Matthew Erickson provided support for both sourcing activities.

“Having Matthew’s support has been invaluable. He helped us through the entire process and attended key meetings with suppliers,” Kim says.

“We have the reassurance that HSV is there to look after contract management issues and to support the ongoing relationship management with the supplier,” she says.

Benalla Health Executive Director Finance and Corporate Services Mewan Dissan says the health service had been negotiating individually with smaller, local suppliers for fruit and vegetable contracts.

“We decided that if we sourced one main supplier with NHW and GVH – in terms of sustainability and supply chain reliability as well as pricing – it would be beneficial,” he says.

Mewan says he expects the new agreement, which is due to be finalised next month, will bring cost savings for the 50-bed health service, which serves between 50 and 60 meals three times a day.

The seven health services attend HSV’s quarterly Hume Region Chief Procurement Officer Steering Committee meeting, which provides regional health services with the opportunity to discuss issues of concern as well as identify potential procurement activities.

Matthew says the regional sourcing activity was a great opportunity for local health services to benefit from working together and leveraging bulk purchasing opportunities.

“While the new HSV statewide Laundry and Linen Services contract was due to commence on 1 July 2025, this activity allowed health services to benefit from reduced costs in the interim,” he says. 

Above image: Staff from Northeast Health Wangaratta (NHW). NHW led the group procurement activity for fresh fruit and vegetables in the region.