How one of California's largest retinal practices centralized $7M in monthly purchasing

Retinal drugs are expensive, and BARA was buying them on one centralized credit card. The card's limit meant the finance team had to pay off the balance every week or every other week just to keep purchasing power available. That cycle ate staff time and capped how much the practice could buy at once.

Everything else ran on a patchwork of individual vendor cards. Different cards for different vendors made it hard for BARA's comptroller and finance team to see spend across the practice in one place.

As BARA grew to 11 offices, most vendors offered less flexibility, not more. The practice needed a partner willing to work with an 11-office practice on its own terms: daily, weekly, monthly, rather than force a one-size-fits-all relationship onto it.

BARA is deliberate about any change to its business platforms. Before moving the entire practice over, one physician ran BARA's purchasing through the Nitra Card to confirm the transition would be issue-free. Once that proved out, BARA moved its full 11-office purchasing volume onto Nitra.

Direct support from day one

BARA was one of the largest practices on Nitra at the time, and had direct, hands-on support from the Nitra team through the move. Dr. Ray, who also advises Nitra, still calls the team directly, and Nitra's founder visited BARA in person.

One platform for every vendor account

BARA now runs its large purchases on the Nitra Card, buys many of the items it used to source from other vendors through NitraMart, and monitors and pays every vendor account from one place.

• $7 million in monthly purchasing power.No more weekly or biweekly balance payoffs to keep buying high-value retinal drugs. The finance team now has room to purchase without managing the limit day to day. BARA has run a single transaction of nearly $1M through Nitra.
• One centralized platform across 11 offices.BARA's comptroller and finance team monitor and pay every vendor account from a single, centralized platform, instead of tracking a decentralized set of individual cards.
• Virtual cards for new hires, issued in minutes.As BARA hires across its 11 locations, new employees get purchasing access right away, with no waiting on a physical card to be issued or mailed.

For Dr. Ray, the card was the entry point, not the reason to stay:

Looking ahead, Dr. Ray points to Nitra's investment in AI-assisted purchasing tools as another reason he's optimistic about the partnership: technology aimed at helping BARA's team spend less time sourcing vendors and prices, and more time on patient care.