Ryan Walicki of National City Bank leads a procurement team with some very aggressive savings goals. With their focus on indirect spend (a bank, after all, can’t print money), they’re tasked with a 500% ROI on their efforts this year and a whopping 700% next year!

Despite those massive goals, procurement has actually taken a lead role in the bank’s sustainability program. As Ryan explained it in his talk at Spend Management Day in Seattle last week, when marketing sees “green”, procurement sees “cost savings”…yet the two are not mutually exclusive.

For example, National City dug into the data about their corporate travel and found that 70% was for non-client visits. Although few would deny that face to face meetings can be important, they felt there were cost and carbon savings to be had. It certainly helped their case when they uncovered that most of their employees did not really want to travel. So they set out to educate their workforce on the alternatives to jumping on a plane, such as web meetings. The results made a serious dent in their travel costs and carbon footprint.

This win-win scenario isn’t unique to corporate travel. National City achieved similar green - the sustainability and currency kinds - in their approach to printing. And you can easily see how this dual approach can extend to things like energy, capital equipment, office supplies and a host of other categories.

As my colleague Latane Conant said recently, corporate sustainability efforts will have to deliver sustainable supply chains, a sustainable environment and sustainable savings. National City Bank shows it’s certainly possible…and procurement can lead the way.

Justin Fogarty is Managing Editor of Supply Excellence. For any questions or feedback on the blog or its contributors, Justin can be reached at jfogarty[at]ariba.com.