Managed Print, Merchandise and Toolkit Services

NCS was set up by the government in 2011 to tackle some of the biggest social challenges in the UK. Through a wide range of community programmes and projects for young adults, it looks to build social cohesion, mobility and engagement.

NCS Programme aims to be a rite of passage for 16 and 17 year olds and to promote a more cohesive, responsible and engaged society. To support impact at this societal level, the NCS Programme delivery is focused on 4 intermediate outcomes for the Service Users and their communities:

Social mixing - improving attitudes towards others from different backgrounds, strengthening and broadening social and support networks, and increasing levels of social trust.

Community involvement - increasing willingness to engage and help out, acknowledge and develop an awareness of power and influence in local areas, and a sense of belonging and influence with the local community.

Teamwork, communication and leadership - increasing confidence in meeting new people, putting forward new ideas, trying new things, and working in leadership positions.

Transition - facilitating the transition to adulthood by improving wellbeing and reducing levels of anxiety, building resilience and empathy, improving attitudes towards work, education and training, and facilitating healthy lifestyle choices.

NCS is seeking to appoint a supplier to manage NCS Print on demand and Merchandise Supplies through an online portal, along with storage and distribution. The supplier will need to provide digital asset storage including an image library and document storage. We expect to launch the tender in January 2020 and the agreement will have a maximum duration of four (4) years.

NCS produces a wide range of printed materials, including template Print on Demand items (brochures, leaflets, flyers, forms, posters, banners and stands, letterheads and business cards) and Promotional Merchandise (e.g. t-shirts, hoodies, pens, mugs, wristbands, bags, sport bottles, sunglasses and lanyards). Our in-house team designs those items and will provide the files to the Supplier. Bespoke print jobs (magazines, company reports, campaign posters) are designed in-house and will be sent to the Supplier for print with additional requirement details. NCS will need to have the ability to customise and personalise print within a template. Some clothing items are used by staff employed to deliver the programme and NCS classes these items as uniforms, and therefore VAT exempt. The successful Supplier will be expected to support this.

We are inviting expressions of interest from organisations to be part of our early engagement to inform the Trust's thinking and contracting approach, we will be running a webinar on 12.12.19 with further information & opportunity to ask questions. Further details of the market engagement & the scheme requirements will be provided to suppliers that express interest will be found at https://ncs.bravosolution.co.uk New suppliers will be required to register.

Additional information:

Registration of interest should be made via the NCS Supplier Portal at https://ncs.bravosolution.co.uk. New users will be required to register.