Caesars Entertainment Finding New Diverse and Low-Cost Suppliers Reduces Time and Expenses

The Challenges Caesars Entertainment (Caesars), a premiere, global casino-entertainment company, wanted to add additional suppliers to auctions held on the Ariba Sourcing™ solution to increase competition, but found traditional methods of locating and vetting new suppliers via phone, email, and sales meetings to be antiquated and time consuming.

Caesars is committed to working with diverse, women-owned, veteran-owned and local suppliers. As a result of the company’s geographic expansion, their sourcing teams faced challenges such as unfamiliarity with local suppliers, and a need to validate that the new suppliers they identifi ed were able to fulfi ll their purchasing needs.

Caesars needed to add more suppliers to their sourcing events, evaluate their ability to satisfy purchasing needs, and ensure that supplier diversity goals were met.

The Solutions

Caesars used the Ariba Discovery™ solution to quickly fi nd suppliers that met specifi c needs, including diversity and low-cost country sourcing requirements. With the help of Ariba Discovery, today Caesars can:

• Easily evaluate, compare, and respond to proposals by receiving responses in a single location, with the exact details needed

• Import new suppliers directly into their supplier database in Ariba Sourcing

• Engage quickly with awarded suppliers who are already set up on the Ariba® Network, facilitating the overall sourcing process from supplier discovery to contract delivery

• 10% savings in overall cost on multi-million dollar deal

• 50% savings in time to fi nd a low-cost country supplier

• 97% reduction in lead turnaround time

S U C C E S S S TO R Y

The Benefi ts

Caesars created several successful postings on Ariba Discovery. As a result, the company has achieved savings in overall sourcing costs as well as time, allowing them to maximize productivity. The sourcing team cut the time it took to fi nd low-cost country suppliers of banquet chairs by 50%, saved 10% in overall cost on a multi-million dollar baked goods project, and reduced lead turnaround time by over 97% while doubling the number of suppliers participating in a sourcing event for drug screening services.

Caesars also used Ariba Discovery to meet their diversity requirements and ended up considerably reducing sourcing cost while looking for a local supplier to provide bulk beverage carbon dioxide for soft drinks along with other industrial gases. “We received strong bids from diverse suppliers and the best price came from a local, woman-owned supplier. This is a huge win – without Ariba Discovery, it would have been very challenging to fi nd this supplier,” explains Kory Manley, Director, Strategic Sourcing, Caesars Entertainment.

“There are several tiers of criteria you can apply on Ariba Discovery to cast a wide net for suppliers,” adds Tim Thompson, Strategic Sourcing - National Beverage Manager at Caesars, who used the service to search for local, large beverage distributors that were already supplying other casinos. “Ariba Discovery has been helpful for me because I took over a different region and category with a learning curve. Using Ariba Discovery, I was able to easily fi nd and vet suppliers in this new category.” Thompson was pleased he received multiple responses despite having such targeted search criteria and grateful that the process saved him time by eliminating suppliers who were not a good fi t.

Caesars was enthused by their postings’ success; they saw very good supplier participation with fi ve-plus responses on average, and they were able to fi nd suppliers that were easier to work with than the incumbents. “We already have many suppliers in our database,” explains Celia Parsons, Category Manager – Indirect and Professional Services, at Caesars, “But if you have been using the same suppliers for years and don’t want to go elsewhere, you may not be using the right or the best suppliers.” Sean Baumgartner, Director of

Purchasing at Caesars agrees: “Our main goal is increasing our supplier base in categories where we only have a small number of suppliers. There’s nothing more valuable than a large qualifi ed supplier base.”

Getting quotes from multiple suppliers and adding additional suppliers to sourcing events increases competition. “If you are going to execute successful auctions, you need to have a large, qualifi ed group of suppliers. Ariba Discovery is a quick and easy way to fi nd and vet additional suppliers to meet our unique needs,” adds Manley. “It doesn’t take much time to create a posting on Ariba Discovery, and you may just fi nd that there are more suppliers than you think. [...] Ariba Discovery is all about simplicity and speed. Having access to suppliers already transacting on the Ariba Network makes our P2P implementation efforts easier.”

About Caesars Entertainment

Caesars Entertainment Corporation is the world’s most diversifi ed casino-entertainment company. Since its beginning in Reno, Nevada, 75 years ago, Caesars has grown through development of new resorts, expansions and acquisitions and now operates casinos on four continents. The company’s resorts operate primarily under the Caesars®, Harrah’s® and Horseshoe® brand names. Caesars also owns the London Clubs International family of casinos. Caesars is focused on building loyalty and value with its guests through a unique combination of great service, excellent products, unsurpassed distribution, operational excellence and technology leadership. We are committed to environmental sustainability and energy conservation and recognize the importance of being a responsible steward of the environment. For more information, please visit www.caesars.com.

About Ariba, an SAP Company

Ariba is the world’s business commerce network. Ariba combines industry-leading cloud-based applications with the world’s largest web-based trading community to help companies discover and collaborate with a global network of partners. Using the Ariba® Network, businesses of all sizes can connect to their trading partners anywhere, at any time from any application or device to buy, sell and manage their cash more effi ciently and effectively than ever before. Companies around the world use the Ariba Network to simplify inter-enterprise commerce and enhance the results that they deliver. Join them at: www.ariba.com

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“Ariba Discovery makes our sourcing process easier. It’s a very simple tool to use, it takes very little time, and it’s been very helpful in fi nding qualifi ed suppliers. We are transacting with suppliers we would have

never found without Ariba Discovery.”

Kory Manley, Director, Strategic Sourcing, Caesars Entertainment