Putting together a tender

[Wonder Woman]

Since I'm not really allowed to do design work for my company (I am busy doing other things at the moment, and it's not in my job decription), it has been decided that I should be in charge of dealing with the company who does our publications at the moment. Since they do such an awful job (proofs are late, final publications have mistakes in them which weren't on the proofs etc etc) I've persuaded my boss to put out a tender for our next year's work (probably about £5-10k). This price is for design and printing of our publications, our website has a different budget, and we're quite happy where it is at the moment.

So, since it was my idea, I have to put it together! But I have never put one together before, and all my graphics experience was inhouse, so I've never received one. Can anyone help me with this?

Coming from the design point of view, I hope you can give me a different perspective as to what you would like, rather than what you normally get. I'm hoping that we can use a designer and printer fairly locally, to make it easier for me to have meetings (and to pop in every 5 minutes to see how they are doing!!! Hahaha, I would never do that - done to me too many times!!).

Thanks everyone, hope you all have a great weekend!

[Vikia]

I used to get quotes for a 7,000,000-run catalog printing in a previous life. We handled all the art production and photography inhouse, but purchased the prepress, printing and paper through a bidding process.

I would definitely go back to all of your previous invoices from the company you are with currently or any previously. On a spreadsheet, group the charges into: Art Production, Photography, Prepress, Paper, Printing, Bindery, Finishing, Bind-in orderforms, Mailing, Shipping etc. If you receive art from advertisers be sure to include processing their files.

Once you have a history of the typical charges you have incurred, then you can forecast what will be typically needed going forward. When you write your request for bid, include everything you can think of that will affect the production. This will give you the most accurate quotes from companies responding. Make sure you give them your mail date and work backwards to ensure that there is enough production time. If time does not permit, then overtime may affect the bid.

Hope this is helpful.

[Wonder Woman]

Thanks Vikia. There's a few things on there that I hadn't thought about, so I'll include those too.