
Lab Spend – Pricing Search Engine for Research Chemicals and Supplies - apsec112
http://www.labspend.com
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Merick
Working with labs, I've found it extremely eye-opening how archaic the
supplier relationship is. A big challenge appears to be with the sales model
and its reliance on contracts, opaque pricing, and exclusive relationships.

This is, of course, made even more complicated because not all supplies are
created equal. Even simple plastics can have slight variations that are
invisible without further testing which can impact experiments. You have to be
careful, and many of the scientists I work with are superstitious when it
comes to buying products, not wanting to risk their experiments.

An alternative I see a ton of labs using these days is Quartzy (YC S11)
([https://www.quartzy.com/](https://www.quartzy.com/)), which also provides
great price alternatives, and also evaluates against other parameters people
care about when it comes to their experiments. They have an entire team
dedicated to vetting these products so scientists can order with peace of
mind. Quartzy also provides some very useful supply ordering and inventory
tools that are a huge boon for lab ops.

There's a lot of opportunities for disruption in the lab supply space. It's
definitely needed.

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eboyjr
Allowing the searching and purchase of used equipment would also help those
facilities running on a shoestring budget.

How to start a lab when funds are tight:
[https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05655-3](https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-05655-3)

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joshvm
The biggest hurdle here is probably the university itself - since this is
presumably targeted towards uni labs. You don't really see this as a student,
but once you start having to place orders through a university finance system
(they're all vaguely similar), it's not straightforward. It depends on your PI
and what they'll approve, what your budget code actually allows you to buy and
so on.

We have a catalogue of approved suppliers who are easy to order from (semi-
automated system). The usual suspects like Farnell/Digikey, Thorlabs/Edmund
Optics are in there. Most universities have a "credit card guy" who will order
things from other places, e.g. if you need a random part from an online
retailer or even eBay.

Some suppliers have special relationships, e.g. we get hefty corporate
discount on certain IT brands in exchange for exclusivity. This means you have
to really argue why you want a non-standard laptop. I've not come up against
this for consumables, but I imagine it's fairly common in bio/chem.

There are other cases which are problematic (1) big orders need extensive
approval, multiple quotes, etc (2) stores which are not in the system and
don't accept credit cards. Adding a supplier at any university is often
tedious paperwork for everyone involved and neither the finance department nor
the retailer like doing it.

The point here is that it's great to be able to find cheap supplies, but
sometimes you can't make that choice. I've had to buy expensive (but
admittedly reliable) optics from Edmund simply because a cheaper store
wouldn't fill out the paperwork. These sites are great in general, e.g.
Octopart for electronics.

EDIT: (meant to reply to this one)

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trentlott
I started entering a number and it automatically ran a search before it was
completed (mobile chrome). Then I put in a chemical that it didn't find...now
I'm outta tries.

