Notice of Intent to Negotiate a Sole Source Contract

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), National Operations Division (NOD), Print Mail Center (PMC), in St. Louis, MO, intends to negotiate a sole source contract with GFI Digital, Inc. (GFI) for the lease of its Ricoh Pro 8210 and Pro C7100 Production printers for a Base and 4 Option years. The PMC is responsible for processing print/mail work for the Agency under strict deadlines with limited lead times, which includes printing, folding, inserting and mailing hundreds of thousands of reports, communications, and surveys forms each year. The planned contract will be for the lease of two Ricoh Pro 8210, one Pro C7100 Production Printers with Finishing Units, Fiery Software and a service and maintenance agreement. The Fiery software, a feature of the Ricoh Pro 8210 and Pro C7100, and is used to streamline the multiple job specifications and variable data printed by the PMC. This requires expert software support, GFI is the only Contractor that offers Certified Platinum Fiery support. Currently, the NOD's PMC has in production other Ricoh Pro printers under lease and maintenance, some of the parts will be interchangeable between machines which will reduce repair costs and equipment down time if the equipment is provided by GFI. The NOD PMC has received excellent preventative service and maintenance on their existing Ricoh printers by GFI technicians. Response time is less than 2 hours when maintenance is requested. Using GFI to provide the new equipment and maintenance will facilitate the maintenance of all Ricoh equipment used in the PMC and minimize disruptions from multiple vendors and service technicians. Period of Performance: May 21, 2018 to May 20, 2019. This is a notice of intent and is not a request for competitive quotations or proposals. No solicitation is available. Firms that believe they can provide equal or superior services are encouraged to identify themselves and provide a substantive statement with descriptive literature and any other supporting information to the Contracting Officer by the closing time of this notice. All information received within the established timeframe will be considered by the Government to determine if more than one firm can meet the Government's requirements and can provide equal or superior services. All responses must be in writing and should be emailed to Shelia.Tucker@ars.usda.gov