In a message dated 12/21/00 6:59:45 PM Eastern Standard Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:

<< I have had that experience, being closed out...  when a customer was
limited
 to one particular brand of product in order to match a look, or because the
 product had some proprietary uniqueness....>>

I have been on both sides of this situation almost continuously for 20 years.
I've been closed out, and have been in situations where everyone else was
closed out. If we are specified without substitutions, special knowledge,
technical work or proprietary uniqueness is usually the reason. Sometimes
close-outs (for or against) are due to fear and/or ignorance. Sometimes we
have been closed out because there are bribes or kickbacks being exchanged to
keep us out.

In one such situation we helped 3 municipal officials find new lodgings in
the Federal Pen for 8 years apiece. Our competitor had done things like
delivering $38,000 in cash in a downtown restaurant bathroom as a bribe to
keep us out of the specifications on some federally funded municipal work.
Their price was double what ours was for an essentially identical item. We
were submitted as "equal", accepted by the architect, an addendum was issued,
bids were received, bids were all thrown out, project was rebid sans Edison
approved in addendum, competitor sold $180,000 of overpriced material. We
protested to the Feds and were upheld, but by then the project was over. 7
years later the FBI hands me a summons to testify and a plane ticket and
we're off to put the bad guys in jail.

>> a sidebar:  regarding ability to close out others on specification
alone....
 this tactic is used both to prevent unqualified bidders from being able to
compete,
 and to limit competition from other, qualified bidders with and "equal in
function
 but not form" product....<<

In the chemical arena, most purchasing law is written to prohibit
specifications from focusing on compositional differences, rather than
performance properties; specified performance properties are supposed to be
limited to those actually required to do the job, and not to narrow the range
of acceptable products based on anything other than salient performance
requirements. This gets ignored all the time, of course. See the comments,
above, in reference to fear, ignorance and illegal activity.

 >>when a specifier writes a spec, the rationale for the choices is not
always apparent,
 and you may never know the details, even if you ask, specially if the spec
was written
 so as to close out a bidder who might retaliate with suit....  I have seen
that done to
 close
 out incompetant bidders, but also bidders who differed culturally or
ethnically<<

You are absolutely right about this.

>> occasionally, one company really DOES have some innovative or superior
feature or
 material, that deserves exclusivity, and in my opinion, that's the only time
specs should
 be used that way....  generally I think specs should be function, not form
based...<<

I could not agree more whole-heartedly.

 Mike Edison