Table of Contents
- Business Services
- VCUDine’s Grocery Store Coming Soon
- Grants and Contracts
- New Hire
- Procurement Services
- Fiscal Year 22 Updates
- Procurement Projects
- New Hires and Promotions
Business Services
VCUDine’s Grocery Store Coming Soon
VCU’s new, on-campus grocery store is coming soon! Ram City Market, located at 912 West Grace Street, will open this fall. It will provide students, faculty, staff and the community a convenient place to pick up dry grocery items, fresh produce, to-go meals and more. Cash, credit and Dining Dollars will be accepted.
For hours, updates and grand opening details, please visit vcu.campusdish.com or follow @VCU_Dining on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter.
Grants and Contracts
New Hire: Let’s Welcome Keon Foster
VCU Grants & Contracts Accounting is pleased to welcome Keon Foster. He is a recent graduate of VCU in 2021, with a bachelor’s degree in finance. Keon joined our family as a grant accountant with the Gamma team. He is a Suffolk, Virginia native, who has always been fascinated by and skilled with numbers and data. Keon feels this role will help launch his accounting career. He likes to participate in sports, do art, and travel. Ultimately, he is thrilled to be kick starting his accounting career and joining the VCU Grants & Contracts team.
Procurement Services
Fiscal Year 22 Updates
Happy new fiscal year! Thank you to Fiscal Administrators for your support over the last year. Procurement services had a very busy year adjusting to the post-Covid era while remaining focused on our core contributions and improving our processes. We’ve provided some examples of accomplishments we’ve achieved, with your help, below.
- Increased number of RealSource catalogs to 35, added 5 external resources and created a SWaM showcase to highlight 7 SWaM certified catalog suppliers
- Added an Amazon punchout that has generated over 500 orders since go live while reducing eVA fees.
- Developed a supplier diversity strategic plan and started implementing some of the goals defined in the plan. Check out the results of our partnership with Facilities Management on the outreach plan for the Arts and Innovation Academic Building.
- Negotiated projected cost savings of $5.5 m this year which includes over $160k in early payment discounts returned to department budgets
- Exceeded our prompt payment standard by paying more than 97% of our invoices on time
- Negotiated and signed 1260 contracts valued at $93.4m
- Administered nearly 53k P-card transactions for over $16m
- Travel reimbursements increased by 250% nearly reaching pre-covid levels
- Improved cycle time of >10k requisitions by nearly 20%
- In partnership with the Treasurer’s Office we transitioned to Bank of America and implemented a new premium ACH payment method as well as converting to existing suppliers to virtual payment options.
Procurement Projects
This year Procurement Services is working on the following projects.
- New Help Desk ticketing system - Team members Alex McWhorter and Kortne Gilbert have led the design and will implement the system this fall. Procurement seeks to gain enhanced and efficient customer service through this automated help-desk solution.
- Travel Management RFP – Team members Chris Kersey and Modestine Carter are working with our intern Dominic Baah to establish a new contract for travel management services to replace the current contract that expires in April ’23.
- Department SWaM Dashboard – Alex McWhorter and Patricia Shazer are working with our intern Peter Carr to create a SWaM expenditure dashboard for departments to assess their supplier diversity goals. This exciting new dashboard supports our SWaM strategic plan and will be available later this summer.
New Hires and Promotions
We announced the promotion of our valued team member, Teresa Hall, to the position of Category Manager for Construction, A&E & Facilities. Prior to the promotion, Teresa performed the responsibilities of the Category Manager in an interim role negotiating two major contracts for AIAB and the Data Center among other accomplishments. Teresa’s willingness to accept new and challenging responsibilities contributed to her selection as Category Manager. We also announced hiring Susan Lewis as a Senior Buyer for Facilities and Construction and starting Monday, July 25, 2022. This position is responsible for various procurement-related activities varying in complexity and dollar value and reports to Teresa Hall. Prior to accepting this position, Susan served University Renovations Financial Specialist with VCU FMD. She graduated from James Madison University with a degree in Technical and Scientific Communication Publication Management and is pursuing a Master’s Degree in Product Innovation from VCU. Amy Collins was added to our team as the lead Procurement and Payment Specialist to support the Medicine for All Institute and Procurement Services. Amy’s research experience at VCU as a Medical Research Coordinate made her an excellent choice for this position. She has Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration with an emphasis in Marketing from Radford University. Please join us in celebrating Teresa, Susan and Amy’s new positions on the Procurement Services team.