For Employers
Lower healthcare costs through employer collective purchasing
Southern Oregon employers can create more leverage together than they can alone. The goal is not just cheaper coverage. It is a smarter local strategy for costs, access, and long-term resilience.
The problem
Premiums keep rising faster than wages. Small and mid-sized employers absorb the pressure, shift it to employees, or reduce benefits. Meanwhile, larger entities usually have stronger bargaining power and better options.
The idea
A Southern Oregon purchasing alliance can pool employers and potentially other participating groups to negotiate from a position of shared volume rather than isolated weakness.
What we’re borrowing from Peak
Local leverage
Peak showed that a rural community does not have to accept whatever pricing structure it is handed. Organized demand changes leverage.
Carrier partnership
The model is not about becoming the insurer. It is about building enough bargaining power to structure better plans with carrier partners.
Real savings
Later analysis of Peak found roughly 13–17% lower premiums, driven primarily by lower negotiated prices rather than thinner benefits.
Why this matters here
Why this matters in Southern Oregon
Employer healthcare decisions are financial, operational, and personal — you are choosing on behalf of people you know. Our employer market is small enough that no single business has much leverage, and large enough that pooled volume would. That gap is what the alliance is built to close.
It is already working somewhere
A community-owned health plan for Southern Oregon
What we are building has a name: a community-owned health plan. Local employers pool their purchasing, contract directly for high-quality care at known prices, and keep the savings working in the community instead of sending them out of the region.
It is not a new or untested idea. Employer cooperatives and community-owned health plans are operating today in Wisconsin, Ohio, North Carolina, Colorado and elsewhere. In Ashtabula County, Ohio, one of the poorest counties in that state, the city school district saved about $2.4 million in its first year. In Wisconsin, a cooperative started by local school districts grew from about 750 covered lives in 2021 to about 18,600 in 2026.
We are not aware of one operating in Oregon yet. Reimagine Healthcare is working to change that.
What it is not
A community-owned health plan is not an insurance company, and Reimagine Healthcare does not sell insurance. Plans are built and run with licensed partners: benefits advisors, plan administrators, carriers and attorneys. Our role is to educate, organize and convene.
Examples drawn from Relocalizing Health by Dave Chase and the work of Health Rosetta (healthrosetta.org). Figures are as reported by those sources.
The building blocks
What a high-performing health plan includes
Employers that have brought costs down while improving benefits tend to share the same building blocks:
- Strong primary care that is paid to keep people well, not just to see them more often.
- Help navigating care, so employees reach the right place the first time.
- Independent oversight of the plan, with the same rigor applied to any other major expense.
- Open networks with known prices, chosen on quality and outcomes.
- Smart plan design: incentives that reward good choices instead of deductibles that discourage care.
- Transparent pharmacy benefits, where you can see what you pay and why.
- Advisors whose pay is fully disclosed and aligned with your interests.
- A plan for the big-ticket conditions: heart and metabolic disease, joint and back problems, and cancer.
Adapted from the Health Rosetta framework. Learn more at healthrosetta.org.
Before your next renewal, ask your broker these questions
Do you receive any commissions, bonuses or incentives from the carriers or vendors you recommend? Will you disclose all of your compensation in writing? Will we get full reports on our costs and what drives them? Do we own our claims data?
Employer Collective Purchasing FAQ
Is this an insurance company?
No. The alliance model is about organizing better bargaining power and then working with carrier partners.
Who should participate?
Small and mid-sized employers are the clearest fit, but nonprofits, public entities, and self-insured groups may also benefit.
When would savings happen?
Only after enough participation exists to create leverage, negotiations are complete, and a viable carrier structure is in place.
Get the employer guide
Request the detailed proposal for the Southern Oregon Community Purchasing Alliance, including structure, rationale, and next-step thinking.