Guide for suppliers

The Government Buying Standards are not only designed for buyers but also for suppliers. They set out exactly what sustainability standards all central government departments and their related organisations must use in their procurement – making it easy for you to see if your products and services meet the standards.

Here’s a step by step guide to selling sustainably. Some of it will be familiar from other processes you may have followed to ensure you can sell to Government.

1. Familiarise yourself with the UK Government’s sustainability policies, commitments and targets. OGC’s guides are a useful starting point as they set out the sustainability issues that government buyers will be expected to consider throughout the procurement process.
2. Explore the Government Buying Standards for the products / services you provide. Even if you don’t meet all these requirements yet, you may want to work with your manufacturers/supply chain to make sure you can meet them in the future.
3. You will need to provide evidence on how your product(s) meet(s) the criteria. Once you’ve done this for the first time, you can simply reuse the evidence for future procurement exercises.
4. Find out when a government department or one of their related organisations is looking to buy a product or service you can supply. Current and upcoming procurements are advertised through Buying Solutions . For all contracts with a total value over £90K, the opportunity must be advertised in the Official Journal of the EU (OJEU) .
5. If you are unclear about any part of the tender, talk to the organisation doing the buying (the procurement authority). This may not be the same as the government department that requires the products. Please note that any non-commercially sensitive information will probably then be shared with the rest of the bidders.
6. Submit a bid for the contract – and make sure you make it clear that your products / services meet Government Buying Standards.

If your products meet Government Buying Standards, you can self certify them using the Greenticks scheme developed by Buying Solutions.Read more about Greenticks.

See also

• Find a product standard
• Read more about how the standards work