Your have an E&I contract with B&H
"Unboxing" Apple Products on Campus, and Why to Use an Apple Reseller Certified for Higher Ed
When managing large-scale Apple purchases for faculty and staff, you may want to use a certified higher education reseller. These may have locations closer to your campus and offer even more service options. B&H is the newest certified reseller for higher education.
E&I Article, November 2024
E&I contract partner, B&H, is one of the top Apple resellers in the U.S. to businesses and schools. B&H has even been noted by Newsweek for the customer service it provides businesses and higher ed institutions. B&H is like a secondary "Apple Store" for customer support. If your staff were using Apple's online locator of nearby locations, B&H locations would be available. Not only can B&H sell Apple products to your institution, but it offers great support.
Procurement teams can consolidate purchasing through B&H and know they are getting the best price and service with B&H's reputation. As an Apple authorized reseller, schools using B&H can use Apple's Volume Purchase Program to save money. Apple isn't known for large discounting, so the Volume Purchase Program enables B&H to offer higher education more favorable pricing when schools know they have a large purchase over the course of months or a year. Volume Purchasing Programs cannot come directly from Apple, these have to come from an authorized reseller. With this program, B&H can offer AppleCare+ on every qualifying device for schools. Often times schools may stagger orders if they do not want to hold products in inventory.
See your E&I contract with B&H
Why it is beneficial to purchase through B&H instead of Apple directly?
Besides being eligible for Apple's Volume Purchasing Program for higher ed and qualification for AppleCare+, there are other reasons why purchasing Apple through B&H may be beneficial. For one in your location you may be much closer to B&H walk-in retail locations than Apple stores, which helps with support. B&H can also sell End-of-Life products from Apple. It can sometimes be a race to secure these devices, that may have the same capabilities as the newest generation, but at a much lower price. B&H also offers support that Apple doesn't focus on, like trade-ins, etching and asset tagging. Apple often gets asked to do asset tagging, and it defers to B&H for this service.
"Unboxing" Apple products for your faculty and staff
College faculty and staff often times use Apple products in their personal lives, so they prefer Apple products for work as well. B&H helps enrolls schools associates and deploy Apple devices. B&H supports Apple School Manager and Apple Business Manager. This allows universities to manage and provide their employees with the Apple devices they are familiar with. And the school knows these devices are secure because the IT team can configure and bundle up all the policies, settings, restrictions, apps, and access to information down to the individual level, without ever having to "touch" the product. This service level keeps employees happy, because their new phone/iPad feels like their own. And an institution's IT team is happy because it does not have to ever manage/touch the device. B&H also has the stores and customer support infrastructure in place to support schools when Apple product issues arise. Overall, B&H is another distribution and service arm of Apple, with experts that support higher education.
Why Members Work With E&I?
6,000+
U.S. member institutions, universities, and K-12
200+
Member solicited buying
contracts you can access
$3B+
Yearly spend of E&I members
means large savings for you
What are Group Purchasing Organizations for Higher Education?
Group purchasing organizations for higher education competitively solicit contracts or create negotiated contracts on behalf of multiple organizations. With a focus on cost reduction, plus procurement streamlining, GPOs within universities and higher education are becoming more popular. GPOs leverage spending across institutions and negotiate discounts and preferred provider agreements. Collective purchasing attracts more suppliers due to larger contract sizes. GPOs help schools with cost reduction, access to more products and suppliers, expert negotiation, spend analysis, streamlined purchasing, compliance, sustainability options, and diverse suppliers.
