The Clinical Center (CC) at the National Institutes of Health has a requirement for a contractor to provide varying quantities and sizes of hospital and guest house linens. The items in this requirement include but are not limited to: bath towels, bath mats, hand towels, pillow cases, sheets, pillow protectors, mattress covers, blankets, washcloths, pajamas, bathrobes, scrub shirts, scrub pants, bedspreads, and laundry bags. The Government anticipates that this acquisition will be solicited using reverse auction pricing procedures. The based period of performance will be for twelve (12) months, with four (4) twelve month option periods. After the solicitation is posted, and responses have been received and evaluated, only qualified bidders will be invited to participate in an online bidding process. This synopsis represents a Market Survey for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Clinical Center which is seeking to identify interested small business manufacturers of the items described above. According to FAR 19.102(f)(f)(1)(2), a manufacturer is defined as "the manufacturer of the end item being acquired is the concern which, with its own forces, transforms inorganic or organic substances including raw materials and/or miscellaneous parts or components into such end items. A concern which purchases items and packages them into a kit is considered to be a nonmanufacturer small business". The applicable NAICS code is 314129-500 employees. Any firms who are small business manufacturers of the above noted products are requested to identify themselves as such when responding to this market survey. All firms are requested to identify their firm's size and type of business (e.g. small business, service-disabled, HUBZone, 8(a), etc). The information will assist the Government in determining in accordance with FAR Acquisition Regulation (FAR) 19.502-2 (b) and (c) whether or not this procurement will be set aside for any of the programs described above. Please note that this is not a formal pre-solicitation notice, but rather a market survey as required by FAR Part 10. Additionally, the provisions of the Buy American Act are applicable to this contemplated procurement. When responding to this market survey, please identify whether or not the products you supply are considered domestic end products as defined in the Buy American Act-i.e. the article must be manufactured in the United States and the cost of domestic components must exceed 50 percent of the cost of all of the components. It is currently estimated that the solicitation for this procurement will be issued on or about December 1, 2008. If there are any questions, please Contact Ms. Lynda Johnson on (301) 594-3111. Responses to the market survey may be emailed to Ms. Johnson @
[email protected] or they may be mailed to NIH, Clinical Center Office of Purchasing and Contracts, 10 Center Drive, Bldg 10 Room B1N313, Bethesda Maryland 20892.