How to find government contracts in Canada and the United States
Governments, cities, schools and hospitals buy almost everything a small business sells, and they have to advertise most of it publicly. The hard part is not eligibility. It is that the notices are spread across hundreds of websites and written in the buyer's vocabulary, not yours. This guide covers where to look, how to search, and how to decide quickly whether a tender deserves your time.
Where tenders are published
There is no single list. Publication follows the level of government.
Canada
- Federal: CanadaBuys is the official source for Government of Canada tender notices. It is free and offers saved searches with email notifications.
- Provinces and territories: each runs or designates its own portal, such as Alberta Purchasing Connection, SaskTenders, BC Bid and SEAO in Quebec. CanadaBuys keeps a directory of other tendering websites.
- Municipalities, schools and health bodies: many post on the provincial portal. Many others use a hosted bidding platform or their own website. If a particular buyer matters to you, find out where that buyer posts.
United States
- Federal: SAM.gov lists federal contract opportunities. You must register there before you can be awarded a federal contract, and registration is free.
- States: each state has its own procurement portal, and many require a free vendor registration to see documents.
- Cities, counties and districts: the most fragmented level. Larger cities publish open bids as open data. Smaller ones post on their own sites or a hosted platform.
How to search for your kind of work
Searching for what you call your product misses most of what is out there.
- Use the buyer's words. A sign shop should search “wayfinding”, “decals” and “traffic control devices”, not only “signs”. Read five past notices for work like yours and note the nouns they use.
- Search by category code. Canadian federal notices carry UNSPSC codes. US federal notices carry NAICS codes. Find the codes on a notice you would have bid on, then search by those codes to catch notices with unusual titles.
- Exclude look-alikes. “Sign language”, “data cleaning” and “training equipment” will bury you in noise if your work is signs, janitorial or training.
- Filter by delivery location, not buyer location. A national buyer may need work delivered in your town.
A five-minute bid or no-bid check
Before reading the full package, look for the things that disqualify you outright.
- Mandatory requirements. Certifications, licences, security clearances, years of experience. If you miss one, nothing else matters.
- Bonding and insurance. Can you get the bid bond, performance bond and coverage levels asked for?
- Site visits and deadlines. A mandatory site meeting that has already happened ends it.
- Scale and delivery. Can you deliver the quantity, at those locations, in that time, without starving your existing customers?
- How it is scored. Lowest price, or points for experience and approach? That decides how much effort a response takes.
The official notice is always the authority. Buyers issue amendments and extend or cancel tenders. Check the original posting for addenda before you submit, whatever tool told you about it.
Make it a routine
Opportunities are won by the businesses that see them early enough to ask questions and attend the site visit. Either set a fixed time each week to run your saved searches on every portal that matters to you, or have the checking done for you.
The official portals' own email notifications are free and worth setting up. Their limit is that each one covers a single portal and repeats a search you wrote. Bidharrier reads the sources on our published list together, checks each notice against a description of your business, and sends one shortlist with the reason for every match. See how it works, or create your first watch.