Safeguard’s Diverse Vendors Complete Small Business Training
Safeguard Properties’ Diverse Vendors Complete Small Business Training Sessions
— Field service company spends $153.7 million on diverse vendors in 2012
Valley View, Ohio, March 4, 2013 – As part of its ongoing initiative to support diversity in its vendor network, Safeguard Properties announced today that about 250 of the company’s minority- and women-owned vendor businesses recently completed small business training conducted in five cities across the country through the Partnership for Small Business Development (PSBD), a collaboration between Safeguard, Citi and the Foundation for Small Business Development.
Additionally, the company reported that annual expenditures with diverse vendors exceeded $153.7 million in 2012. Diverse vendors include those owned by women, minorities, veterans and people with disabilities.
“Safeguard is committed to helping its diverse vendors grow their businesses, and supporting our clients’ efforts to promote diversity as well,” said Alan Jaffa, CEO of Safeguard. “We are grateful to Citi and the Foundation for Small Business Development for creating the PSBD program so that companies like Safeguard can help their minority-owned and women-owned vendor partners.”
Under the PSBD, training sessions were conducted in Chicago, Dallas, Ft. Lauderdale, Las Vegas and Baltimore during the past year to help women-owned and minority-owned vendors build their resources and expose them to new contract channels through official certification as diverse small business enterprises.
The PSBD also is offering 400 of Safeguard’s minority- and women-owned vendors one complimentary year of certification from the Women’s Business Enterprise National Council (WBENC) and the National Minority Supplier Development Council (NSMDC), in addition to local and state-level opportunities. About 201 vendors have been certified and 170 are currently in the process.
Vendors are individuals and companies with whom Safeguard contracts to inspect and maintain defaulted and foreclosed homes across the country. The vendor network comprises nearly 10,000 businesses. On a monthly basis, the company inspects and maintains more than one million properties nationally.
About Safeguard
Safeguard Properties is the largest mortgage field services company in the U.S. Founded in 1990 by Robert Klein and based in Valley View, Ohio, the company inspects and maintains defaulted and foreclosed properties for mortgage service companies, lenders, investors and other financial institutions. Safeguard employs approximately 1,700 people, in addition to a network of thousands of contractors nationally.
Website: www.safeguardproperties.com.
Media contact: Diane Roman Fusco, director of public relations, 800-852-8306, ext. 1213
diane.fusco@s.safeguardproperties.com
