Hall County has opportunities for businesses ranging from construction to dentistry and wants to teach local companies how to find them.

Hall County Purchasing Manager Tim Sims has organized a vendor conference on Wednesday to teach people how to do business with the county.

"I think everybody has the perception that it’s hard to do business with the government," Sims said. "We’re just trying to do this class to let them know it’s easy."

Sims said he hopes the benefits of the seminars will be twofold: introducing new opportunities for businesses while making the bidding process more competitive for the county.

"It hopefully will show them where to watch for the bids, where to see the opportunities of doing business with us and just have a better relationship with them," Sims said. "What I hope it does for the county is it broadens our base of vendors that we send bids to so we can get the best bang for the buck for the taxpayer."

The county purchases all goods and services through a competitive bidding process. Prospective businesses fill out forms known as Requests for Proposals listing their price and other required information, which varies depending on the scale of the project.

The free conference will focus on working with the county, followed by a separate session on how to respond to Requests for Proposal on construction and capital projects.

The conference begins at 9:30 a.m. in the Courthouse Annex and both the business and Request for Proposal portions will be repeated at 2 p.m.

The Hall County Board of Commissioners requested the conference after noticing a pattern of bids being awarded to businesses outside the county.

The county is considering an ordinance that would allow Hall to accept the bid of a local company as long as it is within 3 percent of the lowest bid overall. The commission wants to employ county residents who will spend their money locally.

Sims said it is common to receive bids from across the state and country, but has started seeing more over the last year as people are willing to travel farther for work.

"Our energy efficiency grant that we are going to present Monday, we had bids come from Maryland and Colorado and, I want to say, Seattle," Sims said. "They would have to come here and have the travel expenses but that’s sort of what’s going on with the economy right now. Everybody’s looking everywhere for work."

Sims said he hopes people also will realize that businesses large and small have equal footing, as long as they are qualified and have the best price.

He said a good example is a woman who works from her home who was awarded a bid to do embroidery for Hall County’s Parks and Leisure.

"She’s a one-woman show," Sims said. "No matter how big or small, you have the opportunity."