Can My Business Qualify? How to Register for Federal Contracts
What it actually takes to be eligible for federal work, and how to register your company in SAM.gov without paying anyone.
The bar is lower than most people assume
There is no minimum revenue, headcount or years-in-business requirement to sell to the federal government. There is no application to be approved as a contractor. If you are a legally formed business that can deliver the work and meet the terms of a contract, you are eligible to bid.
What stops most small firms is not eligibility. It is that they never register, or they register and then never look at what is actually being bought. Both are fixable in an afternoon and a weekly habit respectively.
Registration is free — be careful who you pay
Registering in SAM.gov costs nothing. You do not need a consultant, a filing service, or a paid “registration package” to do it, and several businesses exist purely to charge for a form you can complete yourself. If a site asks for a fee to register you in SAM, you are not on SAM.gov.
You will need your legal business name and address exactly as they appear on your tax filings, your taxpayer ID, and your banking details for payment. The name and address matter more than they look: a mismatch against IRS records is the single most common reason a registration stalls.
What you get, and what you have to keep doing
Registration issues you a Unique Entity ID, the government's identifier for your business. It replaced the older DUNS number, so guidance written before 2022 that tells you to buy a DUNS is out of date. You will also end up with a CAGE code assigned during the process.
Registration is not permanent. It has to be renewed, and an expired registration makes you ineligible for award — which is a painful way to lose a bid you otherwise won. Put the renewal date in a calendar the day you finish, not the month it expires.
Certifications are separate, and they are optional
Small business status is largely self-certified against the size standard for the NAICS code in question, so a small firm is usually “small” without applying for anything. The socioeconomic programs — 8(a), HUBZone, WOSB/EDWOSB, and the veteran-owned programs — are separate applications with their own evidence requirements and their own processing times.
You do not need any of them to start. They narrow the field when you have them, which is why they are worth pursuing, but treating certification as a prerequisite is the most common reason a capable firm spends a year not bidding on anything.
Related reading
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