Did you know one out of every seven small businesses in the U.S. is owned by a military veteran? If you’re one of those business owners, you’ll want to check out The National Veteran-Owned Business Association (NaVOBA)’s annual list honoring the best U.S. corporations for working with veteran-owned businesses in 2013 (www.navoba.com/bestcorps2013).
The list honors the big corporations that most successfully engage the nation’s 3 million veteran-owned businesses (VOBs) as suppliers. This year, the list has been expanded and separated into two lists honoring both the 10 best non-defense industry corporations for veteran-owned businesses and the top five defense industry companies.
Non-defense firms making the list this year include Alcatel-Lucent, ConAgra Foods, Dell, General Motors, Johnson & Johnson, JPMorgan Chase, Novartis, Pacific Gas & Electric, Sanofi US, and UPS.
Defense companies being honored include Booz Allen Hamilton, DynCorp, IAP Worldwide Services, Lockheed Martin, and URS Corp.
NaVOBA has worked to increase the number of Fortune 1000 companies that actively seek veteran-owned suppliers. Through the organization’s efforts, those numbers have grown by more than 60 percent since 2007. More than 160 of the world’s largest companies now have programs designed to use VOBs as preferred vendors in their supplier diversity efforts.
