Government Bids

[BradleyT]

I got a fax tonight that was a request for quote from a city government out in Washington. This particular city has all past requests that are now closed posted on their website with all bid amounts received. It looks like I can be competitive on many items that they want however some items I don't have access to.

I noticed that on some of the previous quotes companies would only bid on 1 or 2 items of say a 5 item quote while other companies had bids on all 5 items. Is bidding on only some of the items common and/or acceptable?

Does anyone have any experience with government bids that they would like to share? It seems like it could be decently lucrative as some of the items they want in high quantities (500+) and the items that I sell (safety/protective equipment) are used by every single city in the US.