The federal government is in the process of implementing the JanSan Federal Strategic Sourcing Initiative (FSSI), which would reduce the number of distributors selling to the government from 1,000 to just 21. For the Jan San Industry, there are lessons to be learned from the first Pilot FSSI for Schedule 75 Office Supplies (OS2) which was implemented in June 2010 and has caused irreversible damage to the Office Supplies Small Business Federal Contracting Community.

According to Prof. Samuel D. Bornstein, a lead researcher on the impact of FSSI on small business, the key fact is that for the 2nd Quarter ending March 31, 2013, the 15 Office Supplies Contractors, who were awarded the FSSI BPAs to sell Office Supplies, account for more than 50 percent of all government spending. That means the other 500-plus Office Supply vendors are being systematically Shut-Out of the federal government marketplace in Office Supplies. The trend is that their share will grow and increase over the next few years. This makes sense as OMB has mandated the FSSI for all federal government spending and Office Supplies was the first.

The same can be expected as GSA awards the 21 FSSI BPAs for JanSan in August 2013.

Here are the numbers for the GSA Schedule 75 Office Supplies Contractors:

2010: 28 percent of all Office Supplies were purchased from the 15 FSSI BPAs

2011: 41 percent of all Office Supplies were purchased from the 15 FSSI BPAs

2012: 45 percent of all Office Supplies were purchased from the 15 FSSI BPAs

Through 2nd Quarter 2013 (at the end of March 2013): 53 percent of all Office Supplies were purchased from the 15 FSSI BPAs

This is consistent with the OMB Policy to Mandate FSSI for all federal agency spending and for Office Supplies 20 federal agencies have submitted Commitment Letters whereby they state that they would purchase Office Supplies only from the designated 15 FSSI BPAs. The GSA made it clear in the Draft RFQ for JanSan & MRO that they were in the process of obtaining Commitment Letters from Federal Agencies (Attachment 7) to do the same for JanSan and MRO.