Mitä tarjouskilpailussa oikeastaan vertaillaan?

The cheapest bid won. But were they really comparing the same entity? The spring tenders raised questions that affect both customers and bidders – and which are rarely spoken about in the industry.

After the summer in 2024, I wrote about my TET summer , or what everyday life at Jokiväri looks like when the CEO briefly jumps into the field to replace sales and regional managers.

Now it's summer 2026, and TET is starting to come to mind again. And as is often the case in the field, lessons started to come even before the summer had even begun.

During the spring, we have been involved in several tenders. Some have been won, some have been lost. In this market, it is everyday life: there are many bids, competition is fierce, and every contract has to be earned. Still, it is worth reviewing every lost bid: what could we have done better, was there something we overlooked, was there something in the whole that we did not see ourselves?

While conducting these reviews, a few questions have come to mind that concern tenders more broadly than a single contract. I am sharing them here because I believe they will be of interest to both clients and other bidders.

1. What is actually being compared?

When there are very different actors in the final stage, it is important to understand what is being compared. The total amount alone does not tell the whole story. The price is affected by factors such as project management, schedule management, resources, liability issues, documentation, systems, warranty issues and the ability to bear the risks of the project from start to finish.

In principle, the cost structure cannot be the same if the size, responsibilities and risk-bearing capacity of the actors are very different. If these things are included in one provider in a different way than another, are we really comparing the same entity?

2. Are the resources sufficient for the size of the project?

Even a small company can do excellent work, and the size of the company alone does not determine competence. It is a good thing that even small operators are given opportunities for significant contracts.

But from the client's perspective, it would also be reasonable to assess the financial and operational capacity of the contractor in relation to the size of the project. In renovation construction, surprises almost always occur. What matters is how the company is able to react, manage the whole and bring the work to the finish in a controlled manner. Even when everything does not go according to plan.

Public financial statement information is available to anyone. It is worth looking at it before making a choice, not after.

3. Will the bidder know what the decision was?

I wrote about this after the TET summer 2024, and the same observation still applies: good feedback is valuable to the bidder. If the offer is competitive and the company is left with a positive image, but the contract goes elsewhere, it would be important for the bidder to understand what ultimately decided. Price, content, trust, risk-taking or something else?

Without feedback, the provider cannot improve, and the subscriber will not receive better offers next time.

4. Is the competition genuine?

This is the most difficult question. When is a tender truly a competition for the bidder, and when is a bid requested mainly for comparison – to verify the accuracy of another bidder's price or to produce a reference price for decision-making?

The phenomenon is known in the industry and is rarely talked about. The provider often does not see the whole picture, and conclusions cannot be drawn from a single loss. But if the reasons for the choice do not seem clear in relation to the feedback received, the thought inevitably comes to mind.

Every offer is a big investment for its creator. It takes time, expertise and money. The target is studied, solutions are considered, materials are calculated, schedules are agreed and risks are assessed. An offer is not created by pressing a button, although sometimes it may be thought that way.

Therefore, I hope that when a bid is requested, the bidder also has a genuine chance of being selected.

What does this mean for us and our subscribers?

The number of requests for quotations in this market has clearly increased. This means that we will have to evaluate more carefully which tenders we participate in in the future. Not because every customer is not important, but because making a good offer is a professional job and our resources are limited.

For the client – ​​whether it is a housing company, a company or a public actor – these questions should be translated into a checklist: Are the offers comparable in content? Has the bidder's carrying capacity been assessed in relation to the size of the project? Do all bidders receive feedback? A well-managed bidding process is not only fair to bidders, but it also produces better decisions for the client and fewer surprises during the project.

At the same time, this was a good reminder for the upcoming TET summer. The field continues to teach. Sometimes it teaches about customer encounters, sometimes about pricing, sometimes about the market, and sometimes that not all questions are nice, but they are still worth asking.

Despite everything, I'm looking forward to an interesting TET summer. I wonder if there will be new observations from there. Probably also ones that you can't see in Excel, but that are even more noticeable in everyday life.

Mika Matikainen , CEO