Recouping Your Tax Dollars

Lately a number of industry resources have been sharing their predictions for 2010. While no one has a crystal ball, we’re hearing an overall industry range of +/- 2%, but no one really represents the industry.

From a distributor perspective, every market is a local market.  Geographical considerations will significantly impact your outlook and, perhaps more importantly, the market segments you serve.

It appears, however, that there is a level of agreement that the commercial contractor market will be “challenged” for much of 2010 and that the industrial and institutional markets will be “flat” or could increase given improvement in the economy … and we know that our federal government will continue to spend money!

The federal government can represent an opportunity for distributors, and according to reports from distributors, SupplyForce is taking a lead and helping a number of their distributors by pursuing a GSA contract.

A GSA contract is essentially a pricing agreement with the federal government that can provide distributors with an easier way of doing business with the federal government and 23 states that allow their procurement personnel to utilize GSA agreements through cooperative purchasing agreements. A GSA contract doesn’t guarantee any business.  Federal procurement personnel have the option to use a GSA and not put a “project / material needs” out to bid as the price has already been negotiated.  You still need to either call on the customer or, if you so desire, can handle quotations and order acceptance electronically.

There are many schedules that can be considered, but the primary electrical ones appear to be 56, 51V and 70 (datacom).

Is there money here? Yes. In the 2009 fiscal year, here are some revenues, by contract for some electrical distributors (and many more non-electrical distributors are selling electrical products – we’d consider these companies “brokers”):

Bottom line … if you are in an area with a high degree of federal facilities, your state(s) have cooperative purchasing agreements with GSA or you are interested in a web-based business, this could be an opportunity for recouping some of your tax dollars.

Remember, the government will always spend monies and they are allocating funds for energy efficiency!  If you need help, let us know and we can direct you to some companies that can help (as you would expect, the government loves paperwork!)

And if you are a veteran-owned small business, the VA could represent opportunities due to some recently announced set-asides.