Patching Materials Market Procurement Intelligence Report

The market for Construction Supplies and its sub-segments such as Patching Materials are at an interesting intersection. Periods of macroeconomic uncertainty and increasing stringency of immigration laws are key contributors to the workforce shortage in the market. Domestic workers in developed countries often choose to pursue higher education and less cyclical employment opportunities while foreign workers return to their home countries due to tough immigration laws and economic conditions. Consequently, suppliers have had to increase labor wages to attract skilled and unskilled labor, which has increased their costs and forced them to increase their pricing.

Over the years, regional boundaries have blurred as suppliers foray into different continents, increase their capital expenditure and spend on cross-border M&A initiatives. The deployment of geographic diversification strategies through such consolidation initiatives has enabled the large suppliers to improve their performance and expand their business footprint.

Fluctuation in prices of construction materials has made it difficult for project contractors to maintain a steady cost projection on construction projects. Also, the risks associated with project cost overruns are contributing to project delays and abandonment. Procurement functions are more careful while drawing up supplier contracts and insulating their projects from price uncertainties to the extent possible on negotiation tables.

Trends like these and many others discussed in this report are necessitating a relook at the way Patching Materials is procured and the procurement cost saving opportunities that exist.

Patching Materials procurement best practices are moving towards a level of sophistication which is typically seen in traditional procurement categories. Category managers now have an attractive opportunity to adapt the best practices seen within this category as well as those being leveraged in other non-related categories. This report summarizes the best practices picked from across multiple categories that could work well for category managers involved with Patching Materials procurement strategy.

For example, Buyers should invest in benchmarking studies that help them to improve their knowledge of prevalent pricing structures within the industry. This is based on job role and function that allows them to not only save costs but also negotiate better with service providers.

It is highly recommended that buyers prioritize regional suppliers unless the project specifications are extremely sophisticated and require specialized vendors. A regional supplier base enables buyers to have significant negotiation power due to spend consolidation and exhaustive knowledge of the local codes and environmental regulations. It also insulates them from adverse fluctuations in currency exchange rates.

Buyers should prefer working with suppliers who can bring in specialized solutions for their specific industries to ensure comprehensive delivery of construction related services to buyers.

Patching Materials procurement managers also need to proactively identify and mitigate potential risks that can arise in the supply chain or contracts for Patching Materials procurement. Some examples include: