Check Agency Bid Boards

Bid boards, while still used by some buying agencies to post bid opportunities, are becoming a thing of the past, as the Internet becomes more a part of business life.

In the "old days," every DoD buying office maintained, in a public place, a bid board on which it displayed a copy of each small purchase solicitation it issued for contracts valued at less than $25,000. Every notice was posted on the bid board for seven calendar days. If it was impractical to post a copy of the entire solicitation, the bid board notice offered a brief description and the location of the full text version.

There are still agencies that use bid boards, and you can hire an individual in the area to visit the bid board and monitor it for you. That individual can either send you everything on the board or pick and choose for you. At one time, we had twelve of these prospectors getting bids for our clients. It worked, but was expensive and time-consuming.

The more enterprising contractor will also check out the agency's web site, to see what they buy and who they sell to. This will help narrow your focus when it comes time to find actual bid leads from individual agencies.