Survey for an analysis of the cooperative purchasing model adopted by clusters of the state of Minas Gerais

Although purchasing supplies represents a significant cost for many companies, the proper management of procurement function and relationships with suppliers can ensure greater competitiveness for their products and services, thus bringing better results to shareholders. However, this advantage still seems to be a privilege of large organizations. For internal and external constraints, small and medium companies are outside both the supplier relationship management and the correct management of purchases. Small and medium companies, when they aim to overcome the various managerial or technological limitations (among them the limitations related to supply chain management), can organize clusters that primarily work in the industrial sector. Companies that exist within a specific sector where there is both competition and practical cooperation create these organized clusters. Among these practices, the share and union of purchasing through the practice of cooperative purchasing can be called the main practice. From this context, the objective is to analyze the models for cooperative purchasing that have been adopted by manufacturing clusters and retailers buying offices, focused on the state of Minas Gerais. Thus, a research survey was created and distributed among companies belonging to industrial clusters in the state of Minas Gerais. The results conclude that, in general, joint procurement in Local Productive Arrangements Miners is very weak and unsystematic.

Cooperative purchasing; Group purchasing; Small and medium firms; Business cooperation; Clusters