YPO

Who owns YPO

YPO was set up in 1974 as the Yorkshire Purchasing Organisation, a joint committee of eight councils: Barnsley, Bradford, Calderdale, Doncaster, Kirklees, North Yorkshire, Rotherham and Wakefield. Bolton, Knowsley, St Helens and Wigan joined in the 1980s, and City of York became the thirteenth founder member in 1996.

It is based in Wakefield and is wholly publicly owned. It receives no subsidy, budgets for a small surplus each year and returns profits to its member authorities and customers. Despite the Yorkshire name, its customers are public bodies across the whole of the UK.

Two different ways to sell through YPO

Framework supplier. YPO runs competitive tenders to appoint suppliers to frameworks, which other public bodies then buy from without running their own full procurement. Places are won by bidding when a framework is tendered or re-let, and those tenders are published on Find a Tender like any other. Framework suppliers usually pay YPO a rebate on the sales that go through the framework.

Catalogue supplier. YPO also sells thousands of products directly to schools, councils and other customers through its own catalogue and online shop, from stationery and furniture to cleaning and catering supplies. Getting into the catalogue is a supply relationship with YPO itself rather than a framework place, with its own commercial terms.

The routes are easy to confuse and suit different businesses. A manufacturer or wholesaler of everyday goods is usually a catalogue conversation; a service provider or specialist supplier usually needs a framework place.

Finding YPO framework opportunities

Frameworks run for a fixed term, typically up to four years, so the useful question is when the one covering your work will be tendered again. YPO publishes its framework tenders and awards as notices, and the contracts it has already awarded show which frameworks exist, who holds places on them and when they end.