CASE STUDIES
“Usine de Production d'Eau Potable” UPEP, Drinking Water Production Facility Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines
Bid Leadership & Delivery for Coffrage Alliance
THE PROJECT
UPEP is a $35 million public infrastructure project contract for the expansion and upgrade of the drinking water production facility of Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines.
A demanding municipal water infrastructure procurement, evaluated on technical capability, project experience, and delivery approach.
Coffrage Alliance, an experienced Quebec general contractor, asked us to lead the bid from start to finish.
THE CHALLENGE
Coffrage Alliance had the technical depth the project required. Years of experience on water infrastructure, strong operational processes, and a team that understood the work. The challenge was a familiar one: turning that expertise into a submission that earns points.
Public procurement evaluators score what they can read, follow, and verify. A contractor who knows the work inside out still loses points if the proposal is dense, unstructured, or written for an internal audience. The goal was a submission that made it easy for the evaluator to find the capability and award the score.
WHAT WE DID
Hovester led the full pursuit, from strategy through submission.
We analyzed the solicitation requirements and evaluation criteria, built the response strategy, and structured the entire submission around the evaluator’s stated requirements and underlying needs. We also ran a series of collaborative workshops with Coffrage Alliance's project team to extract the technical knowledge, draw out the relevant project experience, and turn both into content: writing and strengthening the narrative, translating technical content into evaluator-focused language, and positioning the client's differentiators within the evaluation framework.
A particular focus was placed on how Coffrage Alliance articulated its understanding of the mandate and demonstrated its past experience. That's where evaluators separate strong bids from the average ones.
THE OUTCOME
Coffrage Alliance was awarded the contract.
The engagement also left the team with a stronger internal process: a clearer submission structure, a more efficient approach to bid preparation, and a better way to communicate what they do to the people scoring it.
WHAT THE CLIENT SAID
“His support enabled us to structure a clear, cohesive, and compelling submission, while streamlining our bid preparation process. This collaboration directly contributed to the successful award of the UPEP contract”