Are you a furniture manufacturer or Value-Added Reseller (VAR) of furniture products who wants to expand your business opportunities within the federal government? Competing on the open market can be a great way to secure stand-alone bids. However, many of the solicitations that federal buyers release, go through contracting vehicles designed to streamline the procurement process. The Multiple Award Schedule (MAS) program administered by General Services Administration (GSA) is the most prominent of these vehicles when it comes to furniture and furnishings. GSA MAS offers federal customers shorter procurement lead times and lower administrative costs than establishing a new contract.
Last year alone, $718.4 million dollars of spending went through MAS in the category of furniture and furnishings, about equally split between small businesses and large businesses. If you’re interested in learning more about GSA MAS, or if you’ve decided to apply and need a place to start the process, this is the blog for you.
Are You A Good Fit for GSA MAS?
Obtaining a GSA MAS contract, also referred to as a Schedule contract, is not a quick or easy process, so it’s important to ensure that you are a good fit for GSA MAS before you decide to apply. Here are some questions to ask yourself in order to make that determination:
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Review the MAS Solicitation. After doing so, ask yourself if these application requirements are feasible.
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Do you have past performance in the scope of products/services you want to provide to the federal government (can include commercial experience, not only government)?
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Have you analyzed your prices for their ability to stand up to GSA’s determination of being fair and reasonable or not?
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Is your business development cycle ready to leverage GSA-specific platforms, such as eBuy?
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Do you have a position, team, or third-party consultant that will keep your Schedule compliant and up to date after award?
If you’ve worked through these preliminary considerations and determined that a MAS Schedule offer would be both feasible and advantageous for your organization, then we can look at what’s required from the general MAS Schedule application, then we’ll go into what’s required from the Furniture and Furnishings Large Category specifically.
MAS Solicitation: Key Requirements
The requirements of a MAS Solicitation application are broken up into three sections: Administrative, Technical, and Pricing. Compiled together, here are the main documents that should make up your offer:
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Readiness Assessment on GSA’s Website
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SAM.gov Registration Record
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The Past Two Years of Company Financials
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Subcontracting Plan
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Technical Writing to Demonstrate Past Performance
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Pricing Information
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Pricing Support Documentation
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Product Literature, as applicable
For more information on these requirements, check out this blog, GSA Schedule Offer Submission Checklist.
Furniture and Furnishings Large Category
The majority of Special Item Numbers (SINs) under furniture and furnishings will require some form of testing certifications and/or actual test reports for the furniture products being offered. In most cases, a Test and Technical Requirements Certification is sufficient, although GSA may request actual test reports at any point during the offer review process. Depending on the SIN or the specific products being offered, test reports may be required with the initial submission. For example, real test reports are required upfront for loft beds, bunk beds, under-bed drawers, and drawers intended for use under a low loft or captain’s beds.
In addition to requirements that span the entire Large Category, each Subcategory has its own set of testing requirements that products must meet in order to be listed on GSA MAS. The furniture and furnishings Large Category contains the following Subcategories:
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C01. Flooring Subcategory
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C02. Furniture Services Subcategory
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C03. Healthcare Furniture Subcategory
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C04. Household Dormitory and Quarters Furniture Subcategory
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C05. Miscellaneous Furniture Subcategory
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C06. Office Furniture Subcategory
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C07. Packaged Furniture Subcategory
For more information on each subcategory-specific requirements, reference the current MAS Solicitation document that can be found here. You can also reach out to Winvale for direct support through our website.
Packaged Furniture
Packaged Furniture is a unique Subcategory among the Subcategories in Furniture and Furnishings, so it is worth discussing its requirements in further detail. There are two SINs under Packaged Furniture, SIN 337121P which pertains to household, dormitory, and quarters furniture, and SIN 33721P, which pertains to office furniture.
If you’re familiar with the other SINs in Furniture, you may have noticed that an Office Furniture SIN (33721) and a Household Furniture SIN (337121H) already exists. That’s because, while the types of furniture offered are the same across those two pairings of SINs, the way in which business is conducted is vastly different.
Packaged Furniture is intended to support Contractor Teaming Arrangements (CTAs), and establishing a CTA is a prerequisite for applying to a Packaged Furniture SIN. This facilitates the relationship between furniture manufacturers (the CTA team lead), who manage the furniture listings, and resellers (a CTA team member), who add the value of services such as space planning, installation, and delivery. CTA team members do not manage a furniture listing outside of their CTA team leads and do not list furniture products on GSA Advantage.
Want Help Applying for a GSA Schedule Under Furniture and Furnishings?
If you’ve been reading in the interest of applying for a Schedule contract under this Large Category, hopefully you now have a roadmap for what you need to do. Taking a step-by-step approach to gathering information and preparing offer documents is a good way to ensure you’re putting together a compliant offer and there exists many resources, such as this blog, designed specifically to help you during the offer process.
Many organizations opt to pull in the help of a consultant to facilitate their Schedule offer. If you’re interested in learning more about this, reach out to us today.
