Silly Season

And this is also not a partisan post.  We have a bipartisan household and business, and quite frankly, we’re too smart to piss off clients with political jabber.

Recently, the Romney campaign released a series of “you didn’t build that” ads, targeting a partial statement by President Obama regarding small business growth.  One of these ads featured a business owner from Ohio, who built and runs Sollman Electrical Company.

Sam Stein of the Huffington Post recently posted an article pointing out that Sollmann Electrical Company has received substantial government contracts over the years.  The implication throughout the article was the irony of the Romney campaign using Sollmann as an example when he had accepted government contracts.

Sam, Sam, Sam.  Seriously?  When was the last time you bid on and won a government contract, and then executed it well enough to win another one??

My hunch is never.  (My apologies if I am wrong.  I’d love to be corrected.)

Winning a government contract is not the same as receiving a government bailout. The process of finding opportunities, making bid / no-bid decisions and drafting a proposal is complex and time consuming.  The average bid responder spends about 40 hours on the solicitation response, and must develop a thorough contract compliance matrix to ensure proper execution of the contract.

Government contractors earn money.  It is transactional, based on sales, and is not corporate welfare. Winning and executing public sector contracts is quite difficult, particularly for small businesses where the owner is wearing multiple hats and must build bid responses into an already packed day. Generally speaking, there are more obstacles in winning and administering government contracts when compared with the private sector.

Mr. Sollmann, congratulations on growing your business in Ohio.  Congratulations on winning government contracts and including government contracting officers as an audience for your sales and marketing efforts.  I think Sam owes you an apology for his tone and his implications.

Don’t count on it…