Baby Bundle Supply, Packing and Distribution

Description

The Welsh Government will shortly be commencing a procurement exercise for the sourcing of products, registration, assembly, storage and delivery of Baby Bundles in Wales. The Contract Notice will be advertised separately to this Prior Information Notice (PIN) in late June 2023. Baby Bundles is a Welsh Government initiative to provide a ‘welcome to the world’ gift, comprising of a range of products for the child’s first months. The bundle will be provided free of charge to all new and expectant parents resident in Wales. The purpose of this further PIN is to alert potential bidders to a pre-market engagement event that we will use to: Further inform our final tender specification. Explore options to deliver on our social procurement duty. Set out our requirement in relation to Carbon Reduction Plans. A virtual pre-market engagement event is due to take place on Microsoft Teams at 2pm on 24th May 2023. To register your interest and receive an invite for this event, please email: commercialprocurement.peoplecorporate@gov.wales If you have already registered your interest for the previous PIN, we will automatically contact you with an invite. The contract will have the potential for a requirement of between 25,000 to 35,000 bundles per year. It is important to note the projected number of baby bundles is subject to change. The contract is intended to initially be for two years, with an option to extend for one further year. We require the successful contractor to be ready to distribute baby bundles from February 2024. Lot 1: The Welsh Government will shortly be commencing a procurement exercise for the sourcing of products, registration, assembly, storage and delivery of Baby Bundles in Wales. The Contract Notice will be advertised separately to this Prior Information Notice (PIN) in late June 2023. Baby Bundles is a Welsh Government initiative to provide a ‘welcome to the world’ gift, comprising of a range of products for the child’s first months. The bundle will be provided free of charge to all new and expectant parents resident in Wales. The contract will have the potential for a requirement of between 25,000 to 35,000 bundles per year. It is important to note the projected number of baby bundles is subject to change. The Welsh Government will be seeking to contract with a single organisation/consortium to provide (or sub-contract to provide) the following likely elements of the Baby Bundles initiative. (Please note this is early thinking and detailed specification of full requirements will be provided at the time of issuing the Contract Notice): 1. Co-ordination of the registration, order processing and acknowledgements process – this will include the production and distribution of awareness raising / promotional material and the registration documents at specified times pre-birth. 2. Sourcing the contents for inclusion and the packaging for the bundles, supplying and then assembling the bundles (As an example, a list of the type of items that may be required in the baby bundles, together with detailed product specifications that we would expect to be met is attached for information in the document titled 'Items for Inclusion in Baby Bundle'. Please note the items included in the example list are likely to change). Suppliers must be able to source all items and each item must meet the specified industry safety and EC standards and accreditations. Product testing. 3. Delivery - responsible for scheduling and confirming deliveries. The co-ordination of delivery in an environmentally friendly way. 4 Demonstrating existing, well developed supply chains, established freight and border arrangements. 5 Storage of all items and the bundles including holding sufficient stock circa 6000 units at any given time to respond to potential demand. 6 Having the facility (or can sub-contract) to ensure items and/or packaging feature particular designs. 7 To determine how the bundle will be presented e.g. the outer packaging. It is desirable that the packaging be environmentally friendly. 8 Ensure that aftercare is in place including a bilingual customer contact point/helpline is made available and all enquiries, customer support, and/or cancellations of bundles are dealt with in the language of preference (English/Welsh). The contract is intended to initially be for two years, with an option to extend for one further year. We require the successful contractor to be ready to distribute baby bundles from February 2024. A virtual pre-market engagement event is due to take place on Microsoft Teams at 2pm on 24th May 2023. To register your interest and receive an invite for this event, please email commercialprocurement.peoplecorporate@gov.wales