Our original intent was to learn if contract awardees shared any common attributes. To this end, we reviewed hundreds of federal contract awards announced in the Commerce Business Daily from fall 1993 until fall 1995. Contracts were awarded by a wide variety of agencies, both DoD and civilian. We limited the search to contracts for projects located in the continental U.S. which were primarly architectural in nature. The figures reflect data on the 145 contract awardees for whom complete personnel distribution information was available from Profile, an on-line directory of architectural firms provided by the American Institute of Architects (AIA). "% of profession" information came from the 1994 edition of the Architecture Factbook, published by the AIA.
Number of contracts per category attempts to reflect distribution of contract types as found in the CBD.
Size category | % of profession | % of contracts | # of contracts | Contract totals |
Sole practitioner | 31% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2-4 employees | 35% | 10% | 1 | $47,000 |
5-9 employees | 20% | 20% | 2 | $126,000 |
10-19 employees* | 8% | 70% | 7 | $232.000 |
20+ | 6% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Total Employees: Average/Mean | Contract Ranges | Contract Mean | Firms w/In-House Engineers | Engineers per Firm: Average/Mean |
10/11 | $14,000 to $99,000 | $46,700 | 0 | 0/0 |
Size category | % of profession | % of contracts | # of contracts | Contract totals |
Sole practitioner | 31% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2-4 employees | 35% | 4% | 1 | $32,000 |
5-9 employees* | 20% | 15% | 4 | $385,000 |
10-19 employees** | 8% | 42% | 11 | $6,536,700 |
20+*** | 6% | 38% | 10 | $6,273,400 |
Total Employees: Average/Mean | Contract Ranges | Contract Mean | Firms w/In-House Engineers | Engineers per Firm: Average/Mean |
23/16 | $21,000 to $3,108,000 | $240,000 | 9 | 5/3 |
Size category | % of profession | % of contracts | # of contracts | Contract totals |
Sole practitioner | 31% | 0 | 0 | 0 |
2-4 employees* | 35% | 3% | 1 | $32,000 |
5-9 employees** | 20% | 16% | 6 | $574,200 |
10-19 employees* | 8% | 24% | 9 | $1,027,800 |
20+ | 6% | 57% | 21 | $4,756,700 |
Total Employees: Average/Mean | Contract Ranges | Contract Mean | Firms w/In-House Engineers | Engineers per Firm: Average/Mean |
54/26 | $30,000 to $649,000 | $176,000 | 15 | 20/19 |
Size category | % of profession | % of contracts | # of contracts | |
Sole practitioner | 31% | 0 | 0 | |
2-4 employees | 35% | 1% | 1 | |
5-9 employees | 20% | 15% | 11 | |
10-19 employees | 8% | 33% | 24 | |
20+ | 6% | 50% | 36 |
Total Employees: Average/Mean | Firms w/In-House Engineers | Engineers per Firm: Average/Mean |
43/20 | 31 | 18/8 |