State of Wisconsin (government-sector) bid-procurement for plan-printing services - - and a contest

Okay, okay, okay, I know this is boring, but it’s my hobby! I’ve always been interested in “government sector” bids for reprographics, and, courtesy of “Google” search (and “deep-throat”), I found a couple of bids from the great State of Wisconsin that I found fascinating – these two bids were for the same exact procurement; first in 2007, then, later, in 2010.

Keep in mind that the recession had not yet set in when this procurement bid in 2007, but, later on, when this procurement bid in 2010, the recession was deep.

What you’ll first see (immediately below) are the 2007 low-bid and the 2010 low-bid. Five vendors participated in the 2007 bid. But, ONLY ONE vendor participated in the 2010 bid.

Considering the “fact” that the 2010 low-bid-price was nearly 10x the 2007 low-bid-price and the “fact” that only one vendor submitted a bid for the 2010 procurement, one would think that the state of Wisconsin procurement officer would have a) rejected the bid, b) contacted additional vendors to invite them to bid, and c) conducted a “re-bid”. Well, I guess it wasn’t important to the state of Wisconsin to ensure that its costs for plan-printing services were the lowest possible. (Note: isn’t this the same state that just busted the public employee unions and is crying poverty?)

Side comment: when I first started getting involved in government sector reprographics bids back in the mid 1970’s, procurement officers at government agencies would not just rely on “advertising” bid-procurement opportunities, they would actually make phone calls to let prospective vendors know that a bid-procurement opportunity was upcoming. In other words, they encouraged competition. Over the years, this has gone by the wayside. Government procurement officers have become totally lazy; they advertise bid-procurement opportunities on their web-site and, if only one vendor finds out about the procurement and submits a bid, the procurement officer doesn’t give a *___t, because, well, “it’s not their money.” (Taxpayers beware.) (*hoot. What? You thought I was saying something else?)

Sorry to put it this way (perhaps this sounds like I’m a meany), but if my company had a purchasing agent and if we were in the process of bidding out our paper requirements and my purchasing agent left it up to prospective vendors to find out that we were holding a bid-procurement for our paper needs, instead of proactively contacting prospective vendors to let them know about our bid opportunity, my purchasing agent would be out of a job (provided that I’d clearly communicated management’s expectations for the procedures to be followed.)

Okay, here are the results from the 2007 and 2010 bids. Later, I’ll be making a few additional comments.

State of Wisconsin – Department of Administration –

Bid for Printing of Wide-Format Full-Size and Half-Size Construction Plans

2007 Bid – Bid Opening was February 7, 2007

REQUEST FOR BID
FOR
WIDE FORMAT PRINTING of
FULL-SIZE and/or
HALF-SIZE
CONSTRUCTION PLAN PRINTING
IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE ATTACHED
SPECIFICATIONS, TERMS AND CONDITIONS.
Quote Price Per Square Foot For:
Full Size Prints	$.029_Sq.Ft.
Half Size Prints	$.029_Sq.Ft.
Low-bid (awarded) Vendor: Mid-City Blue, Inc. (There were five other bidders)

2010 Bid – Bid Opening was July 15, 2010

REQUEST FOR BID
FOR
WIDE FORMAT PRINTING of
FULL-SIZE and/or
HALF-SIZE
CONSTRUCTION PLAN PRINTING
IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE ATTACHED
SPECIFICATIONS, TERMS AND CONDITIONS.
Quote Price Per Square Foot For:
Full Size Prints	$.27_Sq.Ft.
Half Size Prints	$.27_Sq.Ft.
Low-bid (awarded) Vendor: Mid-City Blue, Inc. (Mid-City Blue was the ONLY bidder)

Note that in the requirements in the 2007 bid document explained that, with every order for printing plans, the vendor was required to provide additional services (and these additional services would not be billable as extras but included in the “per sq ft” prices for printing):

· CD to be provided

· Pick up and delivery

· Each set to be rolled in kraft paper and labeled

· If .dwg files are submitting for printing, it is the vendor’s responsibility to process those files for printing

I suspect, but am not 100% sure, that the 2010 bid document explained and required the same additional services (i.e., that the additional services were to be factored into / included in the per sq ft prices for printing.)

Now, I’d like to continue on with some additional information that, while not evident in the 2010 bid document, must have influenced both the “sole 2010 vendor/bidder” and the other prospective vendors who chose not to submit bids in 2010.

Evidently, in December 2008, an e-mail was distributed by the state to vendors in the reprographics community (and possibly to all parties at interest, including A/E firms and GC’s and Sub-contractors) to explain new procedures implemented by the state of Wisconsin related to plans and specs for construction projects:

E-mail sent out on December 1, 2008:

The migration from hard copies to electronic has begun. The first advertised projects went on our website last Wednesday the 26^th. We will not distribute any hard copies. There is not a list of repro shops. I’m sure we cannot list certain repro shops without having to list every single one. The majority of these folks know what to do with their request. They may download or get a cd or take it to a printer of their choice to get a hard copy printed. Thank you.

Mark Orvis 
WI Department of Administration - DSF
Bureau of Operations Management
(608) 266-1436 (608) 266-1664 
www.doa.state.wi.us/dsf

If you want to see how the State of Wisconsin advertises their construction bid-procurement opportunities, here’s a link to that page:

http://wisbuildnet.doa.state.wi.us/(S(w03ku5vglin3es55b32gt155))/public/bidlist_public.aspx

If you clicked on that link, you saw that documents can be acquired in one of two ways; a) by download, and b) by ordering CD’s.

So, given the change in procedures for obtaining construction documents – from “printing and distributing hard-copy” to “electronic document distribution” (downloadable files and ordering of CD’s), would that not affect the volume of printing services Mid-City Blue is actually doing under the procurement it won in July 2010? Some would say, “you bet your __s it would”. But, how do you really know?

Shortly after I joined NGI in 1997, NGI’s senior partner (Martha Korman) affixed a plaque to my office door, which said, “el profesor”. (Yes, Martha had – and still has – a wonderful sense of humor.)

So, “students”, we now come to “test” time; here’s your exam on this post (and, hopefully, you’ve read the other posts on this blog about government-sector bid procurements!):

1. Once you become aware that any government agency holds bid procurements for the services you provide, what should you do to ensure that you are aware of “future” bids for (subsequent) procurements?

2. What should you do in your market, in conjunction with other prospective vendors, when a government agency includes a bunch of “additional but non-billable services” in a bid for printing plans, especially when you consider the additional services to represent a “wild card” with respect to the costs involved in fulfilling orders issued under the procurement?

3. What should you do, what can you do, in conjunction with other prospective vendors, when a government agency issues a bid document that calls for pricing for services that are obsolete and no longer offered by reprographers in your market?

4. What should you do, can you do, when only one vendor submits a bid?

5. How do you estimate the “real revenue opportunity” with any government bid?

6. How do you, how can you, determine how much business any state vendor is currently doing, or has recently done, under a government-sector procurement?

The first person who submits the “correct” answers (and all correct answers) to this exam wins a $50 gift certificate to his/her favorite restaurant. Rules: 1) the blog author, in his sole discretion, will determine whether answers are correct or incorrect, 2) the restaurant you select must be one that does issue gift certificates and must be willing to accept a phone order for the gift certificate, 3) prior fellow-team-members of the blog author are not allowed to participate in this contest.