Omega Apparel, Inc.

B-411266 Jun 26, 2015 Jump To VIEW DECISION DOWNLOADS RELATED PAGES GAO CONTACTS Highlights Omega Apparel, Inc., of Smithville, Tennessee, protests the award of a contract to Bremen-Bowdon Investment Co., of Bowdon, Georgia, by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), Troop Support, under solicitation SPM1C1-14-R-0080 (RFP) for the supply of Army men's dress trousers with braid. Omega challenges the agency's evaluation of its proposal under the technical and past performance factors, as well as the agency's best value tradeoff decision. We deny the protest. We deny the protest. View Decision DOCUMENT FOR PUBLIC RELEASE The decision issued on the date below was subject to a GAO Protective Order. This redacted version has been approved for public release. Decision Matter of: Omega Apparel, Inc. File: B-411266 Date: June 26, 2015 Marc Lamer, Esq., Kostos and Lamer, PC, for the protester. Joseph R. Weidenburner, Esq., Defense Logistics Agency, for the agency. Tyler L. Spunaugle, and Jonathan L. Kang, Esq., Office of the General Counsel, GAO, participated in the preparation of the decision. DIGEST 1. Protest of an agency’s performance confidence assessment evaluation and source selection decision is denied where the evaluation and award were reasonable and consistent with the solicitation’s evaluation criteria. 2. Protest that an agency’s best value tradeoff decision was mere pretext for a lowest-priced, technically-acceptable award is denied where the record shows that the best value tradeoff decision was reasonable, documented in the record, and that the source selection authority exercised his independent judgment in making the decision. DECISION Omega Apparel, Inc., of Smithville, Tennessee, protests the award of a contract to Bremen-Bowdon Investment Co., of Bowdon, Georgia, by the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), Troop Support, under solicitation SPM1C1-14-R-0080 (RFP) for the supply of Army men’s dress trousers with braid. Omega challenges the agency’s evaluation of its proposal under the technical and past performance factors, as well as the agency’s best value tradeoff decision. We deny the protest. BACKGROUND DLA issued the RFP on August 18, 2014, with a closing date of September 18. The agency issued a number of amendments to the RFP, ultimately closing the solicitation on October 10. The RFP sought to award an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract, with fixed unit prices, for a 1-year base period and four 1-year options, for the production of Army men’s dress trousers with braid. The solicitation established a best value selection process, considering the following factors in descending order of importance: technical, past performance, and price. RFP at 47-51. For purposes of award, the RFP stated: “[a]ll evaluation factors other than cost or price, when combined, are significantly more important than cost or price,” but also advised that “[a]s other evaluation factors become more equal, the evaluated cost or price becomes more important.” Id. at 47. The RFP stated that the agency would evaluate a proposal’s technical factor according to submitted product demonstration models (PDMs). Id. at 48-49. The agency would evaluate the PDMs based on three equally-weighted subfactors: manufacturing operations, visual requirements, and dimensional requirements. Id. The contracting officer would then combine these subfactors and rate the PDM either outstanding, good, acceptable, marginal, or unacceptable. Id. at 49-50. The agency would evaluate the second most important factor, past performance, according to two equally-weighted subfactors: relevancy of prior contracts and quality of past performance. RFP at 50. The contracting officer would consider these subfactors together to create an overall past performance rating. Id. at 50-51. Relevancy of prior contracts would be rated either very relevant, relevant, somewhat relevant, or not relevant. Id. at 50. Quality of past performance would be rated either outstanding, good, acceptable, marginal, or unacceptable. Id. at 50. Considered together, the contracting officer would assign the offeror an overall past performance rating of either substantial confidence, satisfactory confidence, limited confidence, no confidence, or unknown confidence (neutral). Id. at 50-51. DLA received four proposals in response to the solicitation. Agency Report (AR), Tab 3, Pre-Negotiation Briefing Memorandum, at 1. After an initial review of technical factors, the competitive range was narrowed to Omega and Bremen. Id. at 21. DLA’s source selection authority (SSA) then compared the two remaining proposals and issued a source selection decision document (SSDD). Under the first and most important factor, the contracting officer assigned Omega’s proposal a PDM rating of outstanding and Bremen’s proposal a PDM rating of good. AR, Tab 5, Source Selection Decision Document, at 6-7.