The General Services Administration (GSA) celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. You may have heard of GSA and may even be quite familiar with the federal contracting side of it considering you’ve arrived here at this blog. GSA has come a long way from their origin stockpiling strategic supplies for wartime to maintaining the most popular government contract vehicle: the government-wide Multiple Award Schedule. In this blog we’ll go over the history of GSA, how its functions have evolved over time, and what its current initiatives are.
President Harry Truman founded the General Services Administration on July 1, 1949, with the Federal Property and Administrative Services Act. As the name of the bill suggests, GSA’s original purpose was to administer supplies and provide workplaces for federal employees.
GSA states its original mission was to “dispose of war surplus goods, manage and store government records, handle emergency preparedness, stockpile strategic supplies for wartime, and regulate the sale of various office supplies to federal agencies.” GSA’s earliest mission statement reflects how closely tied the American economy and government was to wartime activities coming out of World War II. Today, GSA has participation in every part of the federal government and beyond, dealing with state and local agencies as well.
Today GSA’s mission is “To deliver the best customer experience and value in real estate, acquisition, and technology services to the government and the American people.” GSA specializes in three categories: Real estate, technology optimization, and government acquisition.
Since its inception in 1949, GSA has undertaken the role of providing workspace to federal employees. Today, GSA owns and leases over 363 million square feet of space in 8,397 buildings nationwide. Of the owned properties, one third of them are registered on the National Register of Historic Places. GSA participates in the stewardship of historic through its national historic preservation program.
In addition to preserving historic buildings, GSA maintains a Design Excellence Program that engages private-sector architects and engineers to construct new federal buildings and modernize existing ones.
Some may consider keeping the federal government’s technological advancements competitive with the private sector a “Sisyphean” task. GSA has been pushing that boulder since the 1950s, with some impressive results. In the 1960s, GSA established a government-wide intercity telephone network, the first fleet of gas-powered government vehicles, and laid the groundwork for the modern IT procurement practices. In the 1970s, GSA focused on modernizing government-wide computer operations and began shifting its policies to address the pollution crisis that came to light during this decade.
Sustainability and IT solutions stayed at the forefront of GSA’s technological affairs up until modern day. The Multiple Award Schedule is the primary way that the federal government procures and implements cutting edge technological solutions, with 23$ billion and 22$ billion being spent in fiscal years 2023 and 2022, respectively, on IT related products and services.
GSA’s Multiple Award Schedule (MAS) is the main procurement vehicle of the federal government. GSA utilizes the MAS program to evaluate products and services offered through corporate bidders, and awards indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity (IDIQ) contract vehicles to those agencies that are determined to have high quality products and services at fair and reasonable pricing. The contracts awarded through the MAS drives approximately 45$ billion of government spending.
These contracts have a maximum lifespan of 20 years and GSA implements a rigorous application process for those organizations interested in attaining a contract award. In addition, the federal government is able to leverage its spending power to incentivize the participation of small businesses and other business types that don’t have the same resources to compete with the larger players in private sector.
Businesses of all types often need help navigating the labyrinthian rules and regulations GSA mandates to ensure quality, which is why consulting groups like Winvale exists.
A key aspect of the Multiple Award Schedule is the Industrial Funding Fee (IFF). The IFF is a fixed percentage (0.75%) of reported sales that is paid quarterly or monthly by a GSA contractor, and it applies to all purchases made through a GSA contract. This fee goes directly back into paying for the administrative duties GSA carries out. By being fully self-funded in this way, GSA is able to stay running even the event of major disruptions like government shutdowns.
GSA is an active player in government-wide initiatives while continuing to execute its agency’s mission. They have a leading role in modernizing government technology and fighting the climate crisis. Initiatives such as the upcoming Alliant 3 government-wide acquisition contract (GWAC) are investing money into leading-edge IT products and services to make federal activities more efficient.
GSA supports a greener future by ensuring that purchases made through their Multiple Award Schedule contracts comply with sustainable acquisition set by the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) clause 23.
On the real estate side, GSA invested $1 billion into upgrading federal buildings with sustainable technologies. As part of the Inflation Reduction Act, GSA invested $2 billion across 150 construction projects to support low-embodied carbon construction materials and the construction of high performance green buildings.
The keystone of GSA’s activities is their Multiple Award Schedule. Through it, businesses in the private sector can offer a wide array of products and services to the federal marketplace. As demonstrated by its long history of federal procurement and its self-funded structure, contracting through GSA can be a reliable and lucrative method of accessing federal customers.
If you are interested in learning more about GSA contracting, check out some of our prior blog posts that can help you determine if a MAS contract is a good fit for your business.
Have you already decided that a GSA Schedule is the next frontier of growing your business? Let the experts at Winvale help you with any questions you will likely have as you begin your Schedule acquisition journey.