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/), 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.
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.
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.
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/), 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.