The Federal Emergency Management Agency is one of the hundreds of federal agencies that enlist the services of government contractors. For those who wish to work as FEMA contractors, we can help you with the first step, SAM registration, and also provide you with some essential tips, including the following.
1. Research FEMA
Whenever you take on a new client, it’s smart to learn a bit about the company and how it operates. The same is true with government contracting jobs. If you want to bid of FEMA disaster jobs, you’ll want to learn a bit about FEMA. For instance, FEMA is an agency working with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and was created by President Carter in 1978. At one point, FEMA was actually an independent agency, but it was placed under DHS in 2003.
FEMA is divided into 10 regions across the United States and each region has a central office. FEMA contractors can work in any region, although, from a logistical perspective, it’s often easier to bid on jobs in your region. Here’s a link to FEMA’s regions map – https://www.fema.gov/about/organization/regions. You can learn more about FEMA and read its mission statement at https://www.fema.gov/about/mission.
2. Check To See If Your Business Is A Match
FEMA is called in to help with a wide range of disasters, including floods, tornadoes, fires, hurricanes and other natural disasters, but they’ve also been called in to help with the current pandemic. When you think about FEMA, you might think only about disaster clean-up jobs, but the following goods and services are the most needed items by FEMA:
• Infant/Toddler Products
• Durable Medical Equipment Kits
• Consumable Medical Supplies Kits
• Plastic Sheeting
• Tarps
• Blankets
• Comfort/ Hygiene Kits
• Water
• Meals
• Forklift Rentals
• Cargo Vans
• Security Guard Services
• Generators
• Cots
• Joint Field Office Kit
• Leased Copiers
• Leased Generators
• Office Supplies
• Shredded Bins
• Portable Toilets
• Sign Language
• Temporary Labor
• Janitorial Services
If you can provide any of these goods or services, you probably are a good fit for FEMA, but those aren’t the only goods or services they will need throughout the year. You can head to Beta.SAM.gov to find more contracting opportunities.
When you get to Beta.SAM.gov, you can use this government search engine to find all types of government contractor jobs, and not just FEMA contractor jobs. On the homepage, scroll down a bit and you will see a section marked “Contract Opportunities (FBO).” Click on the “Search Contract Opportunities” and this will take you to the search engine.
As a side note, the FBO stands for FedBizOpps, and this used to be the location where one went to find government contracting jobs, but that website is obsolete. You still may hear people talk about FedBizOpps, so it’s important to know that Beta.SAM.gov has replaced FedBizOpps.
Anyway, when you get to the search engine at Beta.SAM.gov, you can search by “Federal Organization.” Be sure to type in the full name and not FEMA, as it doesn’t recognize acronyms. You can scroll through the listings, and you will see that there are many other types of goods and services needed by FEMA aside from the list above.
One easy way to see if you match FEMA’s current needs is to select FEMA and also enter your North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes into the system. These codes describe precisely the type of goods and services your company provides, and this can be a great way to find exact contracting matches for your company.
3. Don’t Forget About Your State
Many people mistakenly believe that FEMA just shows up whenever disaster strikes, but the process is more complicated than that. The Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act of 1988 (also known as The Stafford Act) sets the process for how FEMA is called in to help after a disaster.
For instance, the governor of a state must first contact the regional FEMA office and request help. This regional office will conduct an assessment of the disaster and the governor also must follow the guidelines of the state’s emergency plan. If it’s determined that the state does need federal assistance, the President has to declare that a major disaster has occurred and then FEMA can come in and help with response and recovery.
While this is a long explanation, it brings us to an important point. Every state (and territory) has its own disaster response agency and there’s no reason why you can’t contract with those agencies as well as FEMA. Often, a state can handle a disaster on its own but will need support from the private sector. So, be sure to search for contracting opportunities within your state as well as on the federal level.
4. Be Prepared & Learn About Contracting
They say that preparation is half the battle, and this is certainly true in case of natural disaster, but it’s also true when it comes to government contractor jobs. Many new contractors mistakenly believe that once you complete SAM registration, it’s easy to attain government contracts.
It’s a truth universally acknowledged (by those who have already dived into government contracting) that contracting can be difficult. While you are perfectly capable of producing a good or offering a service, but do you understand the different types of government contracts? Do you know how to bid on jobs? Do you have an amazing capability statement? Have you signed up with the Small Business Administration (SBA)?
While government contracting is lucrative and usually well worth tackling the learning curve, there’s no getting around the fact that you need to learn all that you can about government contracting. You need to research the bidding process and understand various types of contracts.
You need to create a capability statement, which is basically a resume for the government, and you need to sign up with SBA if you qualify as a small business. SBA has many resources for small businesses, and this includes government contracting resources. If you qualify as a type of small business, this can make it easier to win contacts, as the government sets aside a portion of all contracting dollars just for small businesses.
5. Think Beyond FEMA
While FEMA contractors can enjoy much success with government contracting, there are hundreds of government agencies, including federal, state, county and local agencies. All of these agencies use government contractors. If you don’t see that you are a good match for FEMA, that doesn’t mean that many other agencies won’t need your services.
To search for your state’s procurement office, just do an internet search with your state name and the word procurement. For instance, when we search for “Oregon” and “procurement,” the first result is the Procurement Services division of the Oregon state government. Just ensure that you click on webpages that have URLs that end in .gov, as these are government-supported websites.
Of course, for potential FEMA contractors or any government contractor, the first step is always completing your System for Award Management registration, or SAM registration. While the government does not charge a fee for this service, many people decide to hire a third-party registration service for this process.
SAM registration can be a complicated and frustrating task and can take 10 or more hours to complete. It can simply be easier and faster to pay an expert to handle this task, and we handle hundreds of SAM registration every year.
We can complete your SAM registration quickly and accurately so that you will be approved and ready to serve as FEMA contractors soon. To get started, call us at (800) 985-7658 or simply click on the green “New Registration” tab on our homepage.