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RFP writing and public procurement

Public money is the biggest customer in the country. Canadian public sector procurement runs to roughly $200 billion a year, and Ontario municipalities alone spend more than $22 billion a year on goods and services.

Our operations founder writes every municipal RFP her company submits, across 1,800 municipalities. In the last twelve months that work grew municipal sales by 50 percent, in a year when a whole block of contracts came up at once and each had to be won again on paper.

01 / The problem

Incumbency doesn't renew a contract any more.

Contracts are tendered again on fixed cycles. Holding the work for ten years earns you nothing at the moment an evaluation committee opens the envelopes. You're scored on the same sheet as everybody else, including the people who have never done the job.

Evaluation is scored and documented. Mandatory requirements, pricing, references, capacity and increasingly local content are each weighted and marked. One missed form disqualifies a bid before anyone reads the good part of it.

Prequalification has moved the same way. Owners screen contractors through platforms like ISN and Cognibox, and COR certification is a common condition of public work. The bid is where the contract is won, and most companies write it the night before it's due.

02 / What we do

Everything this covers.

Writing the response

  • Full RFP and RFQ responses written end to end
  • Technical approach and methodology sections
  • References, past performance and capacity narratives
  • Resourcing plans that match what you can field
  • Executive summaries written so a scorer can mark them

Not losing on a technicality

  • A compliance matrix mapping every mandatory requirement to where you answered it
  • Form, appendix and addendum tracking
  • Submission format, portal and deadline management
  • Mandatory site meeting and question period tracking

Pricing and scoring

  • Pricing built against the published evaluation criteria
  • Working out where the points are before writing a word
  • Scenario pricing across term lengths and volumes
  • Knowing when not to bid, which saves more money than winning some of them

Doing it faster next time

  • A reusable content library instead of writing from scratch every time
  • Approved boilerplate maintained instead of reinvented
  • Past submissions organised and searchable
  • Bid calendars, so a fresh tender never arrives as a surprise

Getting on the list

  • Prequalification and vendor registration
  • ISN and Cognibox profiles kept current
  • Supplier portal registration across multiple jurisdictions
  • Certification, insurance and safety documentation assembled and maintained

Private sector bids

  • National and franchise account pitch frameworks
  • Multi location and multi city campaign proposals
  • Partnership frameworks built once and replicated across chains
  • Case studies and reference material that gets reused
03 / How it works

The order we do it in.

01

Read it properly

The whole document, including every addendum and the evaluation table. Most losing bids are lost right here, by answering the RFP someone assumed was being asked.

02

Build the matrix

Every mandatory requirement and every scored criterion mapped to where it gets answered and who owns it. Nothing gets written until this exists.

03

Write to the score

Sections written against what the evaluator marks, in their language and their order, with the evidence they asked for attached where they asked for it.

04

Bank it

The response goes into a content library, so the next bid starts most of the way written instead of at zero.

04 / Fit

Who this is for.

A good fit

  • Companies bidding to municipalities, regional districts and school districts
  • Contractors and suppliers facing prequalification requirements
  • Businesses with public sector contracts coming up for tender again
  • Companies that have never bid publicly and want to start
  • Anyone who has lost a bid on a missed form
  • Teams writing every proposal from scratch, every time
05 / Questions

What people ask about this.

Can you write the whole response, or only review ours?
Either. We write complete responses, and we also review a bid you've drafted against the evaluation criteria before it goes in, which is the cheapest thing you can possibly buy from us. The review usually finds a mandatory requirement answered somewhere the scorer won't look for it.
We've never bid on public work. Where do we start?
Vendor registration on the relevant portals, then prequalification where it's required, then a first bid chosen because you can win it instead of because it's big. We can run all three. Most first time bidders lose on documentation instead of on capability, and that part is entirely fixable.
How far ahead do you need to be involved?
As early as you can manage, ideally as soon as the opportunity is posted, which usually gives three to four weeks. We can work to less, but compressed timelines cost you the parts that win points: references gathered properly, pricing modelled against the criteria, and a real review before submission.
06 / Related

The work next door.

These almost always come up together. An audit that finds a process problem usually finds a data problem underneath it.

Start here

Start with the audit.

Every business is different, so we scope the audit that way. We spend time inside your operation and watch the work actually happen. You get a written map of every valley, what it costs you a year, and what it would take to flatten it. That document is yours whether or not we build anything.

Emailadaignault@peaksnvalleysconsulting.com
Phone(250) 423-9511
FoundersKamila Domanska · Alex Daignault
Based inNelson, British Columbia
ServingCanada and the United States