The Company

Beam is a social enterprise that supports some of the most disadvantaged people in our society into quality jobs and homes, leveraging their crowdfunding platform and 1-1 caseworker model. Beam started working directly with the public sector in 2019, focusing on reducing homelessness and offering refugee support. Nowadays, Beam’s award-winning service is commissioned by over 50 government authorities to deliver better outcomes for homeless people, and refugees and prison leavers. You can read more about the amazing work Beam does here.

The Challenge

When Beam decided to start working with the public sector, the team faced an instant challenge. As an SME business with limited resources, they lacked the time needed to find relevant opportunities. With most of the team fully dedicated to 1-1 caseworker support, there was simply no time to waste on government tender portals.

 “Instead, we would proactively reach out to local authorities asking for opportunities. However, because of the way procurement cycles work, we’d often miss the boat. - Randi Lawrence, Bid Manager

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When Randi Lawrence joined the team in May 2022, Beam had begun to build out a commercial team and had won initial contracts with local authorities. Randi was new to working with the government and was handed the responsibility of using Stotles to find and win new public sector business.

The Solution

After signing up to our platform, Stotles’ customer support manager Scarlett Cinotti set Beam up with correct signal-settings to ensure Randi could log into Stotles every morning and identify opportunities for their team in less than 10 mins.

“Stotles took what could have been a task for three or four, full-time staff members and whittled it down to being something that I could do by logging into Stotles every day.” - Randi Lawrence, Bid Manager

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After identifying authorities relevant to Beam, Scarlett created custom views for Randi, segmented by buyer (local and central government) and time (open and upcoming opportunities). With these views, Randi was able to learn the ropes of public sector procurement with Stotles as her companion.

The Results

Just two weeks into using Stotles, a £100,000 tender popped up in Beam’s Stotles feed. The tender called for a supplier to support re-housing 100+ Afghan families living in bridging hotels across London.

“We would not have found that opportunity if it weren't for Stotles because I would not have been looking on capitalEsourcing, the City of London's procurement portal” - Randi Lawrence, Bid Manager

After qualifying the source documents, Randi knew Beam could deliver the requirements. She submitted the bid and within two weeks, Beam had won the contract. After successfully completing the project and rehousing the families, Beam have gone on to win dozens of contracts with local authorities to provide support for Afghan and Ukrainian refugees in bridging hotels.

“This would not have happened If I had not found the original contract on Stotles… it has literally changed our business.” - Randi Lawrence, Bid Manager

Nowadays Randi uses her view of upcoming expiries to anticipate contract renewals relevant to Beam. By engaging directly with commissioners before the open tender, the team now takes a more proactive approach to working with the public sector. To read more about how Beam provides support to refugees across the UK, click here.

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To replicate the success of Beam and accelerate your public sector sales with Stotles, please speak to a member of our sales team here.

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