KING OF PRUSSIA , PA.— Over the past year, the slow economy has overshadowed the news about e-commerce. However, business is on the rise for national accounts and e-commerce provider supplyFORCE.

Archer Daniels Midland Co. awarded supplyFORCE a contract for national account service. Under the agreement, supplyFORCE will provide electrical supplies procurement for the Decatur, Ill.-based agricultural processing giant.

The value of the account was undisclosed.

The supplyFORCE network is made up of over 300 independent distributors with more than 4,000 locations nationwide with annual revenues in excess of $18 billion.

The supplier network was spun off from Affiliated Distributors and acquired its national accounts business, so most of its affiliates are AD members.

An Archer Daniels Midland spokesperson said the company chose supplyFORCE because of its proven record of success in efficiently implementing multi-plant agreements and providing cost savings. It also offers services like classifying inventory, warranty tracking, bar coding and site assessing.

"Our independent member distributors are our strength," said Jim Piraino, supplyFORCE president and CEO.

The network boasts more than 40 contracts and over $300 million in annual revenue. Piraino said he expects the business to be profitable within the next quarter.

"Most of our national distributor competitors are limited to certain product lines and areas of expertise," said Piraino. "We offer over three million items and can seamlessly assemble local experts across the country to provide high quality local service to national accounts."

Piraino said supplyFORCE fulfills all of the promises offered by B-to-B dot-coms with all of the integration to drive down costs and increase efficiency.

The company also provides strong independent distributors to service the accounts at a local level.

"We enable them to remain independent," Piraino said of supplyForce affiliates.

"As customers are increasingly interested in national accounts, we provide a way for the small distributor to keep that business and compete with large national distributors."

He says many national account programs only provide for half of a facility's purchases, but supplyForce can provide better than 90 percent of procurement needs.