May 13, 2019 Leadership Unplugged at ERC

By Ben Heller

Adding value to the moving industry by addressing broken move pricing was the topic in this five minute interview I recently did with Worldwide ERC CEO Peggy Smith

 

During my 15 years as a procurement consultant, I thought I was doing the right thing when I encouraged clients to select movers based on the lowest cost. I later realized the lowest cost selection is bad for both clients and movers. RFPs only encourage this negative lowest cost outcome. In researching a way to avoid this mistake in the future, I found a piece of technology that automated move pricing for the movers.

“Procurement does a disservice to the mobility industry.”

That opportunity was with PricePoint founder, Ryan Keintz, to build a front-end solution that connects buyers to their movers and movers to their downstream supply chain. This automated move pricing means there is no need for audits or RFPs or multiple surveys. In other words, PricePoint helps movers price the way clients buy and so strengthens partnerships.

The sense of partnerships throughout the industry is a large part of the reason I fell in love with the mobility. At a prior ERC conference visiting every booth, I discovered he liked all the people. It seems everyone in the moving industry is warm, empathetic, and interested in helping people. These are my kind of people.  Supporting the PricePoint partners – RMCs and movers – continues to be a core value. It’s part of the reason PricePoint doesn’t sell directly to corporate clients, and instead supports their partners’ sales efforts.

Ben Heller

CEO Ben fell in love with the mobility industry while running Accentureʼs global mobility consulting practice. Focusing on the mobility supply chain, he learned the hard way that move pricing is complicated, unclear, and vulnerable to manipulation. After evaluating all existing alternatives, Ben partnered with Ryan to make data-driven moving decisions possible.