Find a TenderPlanned procurementPreliminary market engagement notice
Published 2 Nov 2026, 15:43 GMT

Official UK procurement notice

Advertising Consultant Contract (Bus Shelters, Street Furniture and On-Street) - Soft Market Testing

Authority: The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames (Local council)

ServicesBelow threshold
Sectors: Architecture & Engineering (71) Delivery: UK
Planned pipeline value£100,000pipeline notice, not a live tender
Tender notice expected 23 Nov 2026from the planned procurement notice
Contract term 1 yrends 31 Jan 2028 · starts 18 Jan 2027
Notice summaryFrom the published notice

The Royal Borough of Kingston is seeking to engage with the services of an experienced commercial procurement and media consultant to lead an advertising procurement exercise. Including the design, management and lead of an end-to-end procurement exercise for its borough-wide advertising portfolio.

What is being bought

Published requirement description

The Royal Borough of Kingston is seeking to engage with the services of an experienced commercial procurement and media consultant to lead an advertising procurement exercise. Including the design, management and lead of an end-to-end procurement exercise for its borough-wide advertising portfolio. The primary aim is to appoint an expert consultant who can maximise commercial revenue, enhance public realm infrastructure and integrate digital technology.

This document outlines the background and scope of the proposed consultancy commission. The Council invites interested consultancy practices to complete the questionnaire in Section C, D, and E to help inform the Council’s procurement strategy, specification, resourcing model and timeline.

CPV: Architectural, construction, engineering and inspection services

The lotProcurement structure

single lot · no lot value published
Lot #1Planned 1 yr

Pipeline intelligence · planning stage: how this market runs before the tender is published

How The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames buys Architectural, construction, engineering (CPV 71), and who usually turns up

The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames’s published record next to the market for the same work. Frameworks and DPS are left out: they draw different bid counts. Whole-market view: Architectural, construction, engineering (CPV 71) →

1

How the contest usually goes

Winner shares use published awards; bid and price charts use contested lots.

Question for the bid
This buyerThe Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames · all categories
What to do with it
How often do SMEs win?
i

How often small and medium firms win.

Share of awards where the winner’s size is known.

The counts under this question show how many awards have a known supplier size.

Last 36 months.

Buyer: 37 of 50 known-size awards · market: division 71 · UK-wide, n=3,031
74%56%

Small firms have won here. Neither number says whether you qualify; it describes who has been winning.

How often do local suppliers win?
i

How often local firms win similar work.

Winners with a registered address in the delivery region, out of awards with a known address.

Local means the winner is registered in the region where that award was delivered.

A local branch does not count if the registered address is elsewhere.

Last 36 months.

Buyer: 33 of 69 known-location awards · market: division 71 · UK-wide, n=2,830
48%52%

Most of this buyer’s recorded winners were registered outside the region where that award was delivered.

How long to a decision?
i

How long buyers here take to decide after bids close.

Middle value in days from the bid deadline to the award date, on competitions that published both.

Only decided tenders count, so slow ones still waiting are not in.

Last 36 months.

Buyer: no decision dates published · market: division 71 · UK-wide, n=568
—46 days

Half of these awards have an award date within 46 days of the bid deadline.

How often single-bid or direct?
i

How often work is awarded with no recorded rival.

Direct awards and tenders where every published lot count shows one bid.

Both shares are minimums: some awards have no bid count.

Thin markets produce this too; it is not proof of a tailored specification.

Last 36 months.

Buyer: at least 43 of 69 procurements with awards had no recorded rival · market: division 71 · UK-wide, n=4,262
62%43%

Direct awards or one recorded bid are common here. Check the route before spending time on a bid.

How many bids did past lots attract?

i

How many bids past lots received.

Each colour is a bid-count range. Only competed lots with a published count are included.

Past bids do not predict this tender.

Last 36 months.

This buyer12 lots with bid counts · all categories
25% had one bid
The market1,116 lots with bid counts · division 71 · UK-wide
13% had one bid
Buyer / market · select a colour for counts
1 bid25% / 13%
Buyer: 3 of 12 lots with published bid counts. Market: 141 of 1,116 lots with published bid counts.
2–333% / 22%
Buyer: 4 of 12 lots with published bid counts. Market: 250 of 1,116 lots with published bid counts.
4–633% / 29%
Buyer: 4 of 12 lots with published bid counts. Market: 329 of 1,116 lots with published bid counts.
7+8% / 35%
Buyer: 1 of 12 lots with published bid counts. Market: 396 of 1,116 lots with published bid counts.

How did awards compare with estimates?

i

Where winning prices landed against estimates.

Each colour shows awards below, close to or above the published estimate, one lot at a time.

Past prices are a guide, not a bid price.

Last 36 months.

This buyer5 lots with estimate and award · all categories
40% below estimate
The market747 lots with estimate and award · division 71 · UK-wide
48% below estimate
Buyer / market · select a colour for counts
Below estimate40% / 48%
Buyer: 2 of 5 lots with an estimate and award. Market: 362 of 747 lots with an estimate and award.
Within ±2%60% / 34%
Buyer: 3 of 5 lots with an estimate and award. Market: 257 of 747 lots with an estimate and award.
Above estimate0% / 17%
Buyer: 0 of 5 lots with an estimate and award. Market: 128 of 747 lots with an estimate and award.
2

Assess each lot
i

What past awards tell you about each lot.

See the forecast, this buyer’s earlier suppliers and firms with relevant wins.

No supplier is confirmed as a bidder.

Open a lot for its forecast, this buyer’s previous supplier and possible competitors, from published award history, not a bid list

Lot #1CPV 7112 monthsPublished estimate£100k

This lot lists more than one class in CPV 71. The comparison uses that group.

Expected competition
i

How many bids this lot may attract.

The forecast uses similar past competitions. The bar shows either that forecast or past bid counts; the line below says which.

Each lot shows its own forecast based on its own category; forecasts for different lots of the same notice are not comparative. The bar shows 1,116 past lots.

A forecast, not a list of bidders.

—No model forecast yet13% chance of a single bid
Past bids on 1,116 similar lots
1 bid13%
141 of 1,116 similar past lots received 1 bid (13%).
2–322%
250 of 1,116 similar past lots received 2–3 (22%).
4–629%
329 of 1,116 similar past lots received 4–6 (29%).
7+35%
396 of 1,116 similar past lots received 7+ (35%).
Comparable past lots usually drew 5 bids.
Commercial price forecast
i

Where the award price may land.

The forecast uses similar awards and the buyer’s estimate. The band covers the middle half of likely prices.

No comparable awards for this lot yet.

A statistical guide from past awards, not a price to bid.

—No model forecast yet
No comparable awards on record for this lot’s category yet. The published estimate is £100k, and the forecast stays empty until the market has a record to read.

Who has supplied this buyer on similar work?
i

Who has done similar work for this buyer.

Past contracts are matched by buyer, title and type of work.

A past supplier may not bid again.

No earlier contract of this buyer matches this lot on the published record.

Who could compete for this lot?
i

Who could compete for this lot?

Firms with relevant past wins. On a framework, we show firms on that agreement.

None is confirmed as a bidder.

Candidate suppliers for this notice have not been worked out yet, so this is not a verdict that nobody fits.

About this data
  • Source. Official UK public procurement notices (Find a Tender), reused under the Open Government Licence v3.0. New notices arrive through the day; the figures are rebuilt nightly.
  • Two views, kept apart. The authority’s own track record and the wider market for the same kind of work sit side by side and are never mixed. Where the local picture is too thin, a figure widens to a broader market and says which one it used.
  • Forecasts are labelled. The price forecast and its range, possible competitors and the earlier-work matches are our estimates from past awards: not published facts, not win chances and not price advice. Official notices do not say who is bidding.
  • Every figure shows what it rests on. Not every notice publishes a bid count, a value or a delivery region, so each figure carries the number of records behind it, and one built on few records is marked as such. The on a figure explains it; the counting rules are in the methodology. Spotted something wrong? Tell us.

Procedure terms & legal framework

From the official record
Legal basis
UKPGA · 2023/54 Procurement Act 2023
Procurement category
Services
Notice status
Planned procurement
Procurement threshold
Below threshold
Regulatory regime
Standard
Commercial structure
Stand-alone contract (no framework)
Competition type
Competitive procedure
GPA / WTO covered
Unspecified in notice
Recurring procurement
Unspecified in notice
First published
2 Nov 2026, 15:43 GMT
Last source update
2 Nov 2026, 15:43 GMT
Authority reference
DN834788
FTS notice number
2026/S 000-103862
Latest notice
Preliminary market engagement notice (UK2)
Classification (CPV)
Architectural, construction, engineering and inspection services
Delivery area
UK
Official registry OCID
ocds-h6vhtk-0795df Find a Tender

How it was run

Official notice
Submission deadline
—

Timeline

2 Nov 2026 → 18 Jan 2027 · 4 dates
  1. Planning notice published9h ago
    2 Nov 2026, 15:43 GMT
  2. Today
    3 Nov 2026
  3. Market engagementin 3 days
    6 Nov 2026, 23:59 GMT

    The Royal Borough of Kingston is seeking to engage with the services of an experienced commercial procurement and media consultant to lead an advertising procurement exercise. Including the design, management and lead of an end-to-end procurement exercise for its borough-wide advertising portfolio. The primary aim is to appoint an expert consultant who can maximise commercial revenue, enhance public realm infrastructure and integrate digital technology.

  4. Tender notice expectedin 20 days
    23 Nov 2026, 23:59 GMT
  5. Contract startsin 75 days
    18 Jan 2027

Notice history

1 event · 1 release on Find a Tender
  1. Preliminary market engagement notice published
    2 Nov 2026, 15:43 GMT
    UK2

Commercial outcome & contract awards

Pipeline notice
Awards (0)
No award published
Contracts (0)
No contract published
Bid statistics
No aggregate bid statistics published

Contracting authority & participating public bodies

The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames

Contracting authorityPublic authority - sub-central government GB-PPON: PWRN-9366-HZGV Guildhall 2, Kingston upon Thames, London, KT1 1EUContact name, email, phone

Official documents & specifications (1)

Official links; attachments are not copied

Notices published for this procedure