CSF-16-1098 Concert Event Services

The California Exposition & State Fair (Cal Expo) is seeking a contractor to provide comprehensive concert event services for the 2016 California State Fair Concert Series through Invitation for Bid (IFB #CSF-16-1098). The procurement covers services including crowd management, ticket taking, ushering, guest services, and access area monitoring across 17 scheduled concerts from July 8-24, 2016. Bidders must provide unit pricing for Event Staff Persons, Event Supervisors, and Event Managers, with the evaluation based on the lowest total hourly bid across these three categories. Minimum qualifications require the bidding firm to have five years of event management experience at venues with at least 5,000-person seating capacity, and the Event Manager must have three years of similar experience. A mandatory site visit is scheduled for May 25, 2016, at 12:00 noon, with final bids due on June 1, 2016, at 2:00 PM. The contract will run from July 1, 2016, through July 31, 2017, with each concert beginning at 8:00 PM and lasting approximately 90 minutes.

The solicitation specifically encourages small businesses to participate in the bidding process. Contractors must maintain commercial general liability insurance with minimum limits of $1 million per occurrence and carry workers' compensation insurance. While no specific set-aside designations for disadvantaged enterprises are explicitly mentioned, the emphasis on small business participation suggests a preference for smaller local vendors. The contract covers event services at the California State Fair located at 1600 Exposition Blvd., Sacramento, CA 95815, spanning Sacramento County and potentially impacting San Francisco City. Although specific budget ranges are not detailed in the provided documentation, the comprehensive nature of the services and the multi-event scope indicate a potentially significant contract value. The procurement strategy focuses on selecting a vendor with proven experience in large-venue event management through a competitive bidding process that evaluates both qualitative experience and pricing structure.