Government Contracts

Government Snow Removal Contracts: Where the Work Is, and the Ford F-350 Plow Truck That Does It

By UX Auctions Editorial Staff

The first snow removal bids of the season are already open. On October 25, 2026, federal agencies had eight snow and ice removal solicitations taking bids on SAM.gov, every one of them due within the next two weeks, and seven of the eight set aside for small businesses. A contractor with a plow truck, a salt spreader and a current SAM.gov registration is looking at a live market, and the UX Network now puts the whole picture on one page: the contracts on UX Contract, the trucks on UX Search, and what those trucks really sold for.

Who is buying snow removal right now

The agencies taking bids this week are the ones that run buildings and grounds in snow country. The Department of Veterans Affairs is buying snow and ice removal management for its medical center in Beckley, West Virginia, and separately for the Wilmington VA Medical Center, both set aside for service-disabled veteran-owned small businesses. The Indian Health Service wants snow removal and de-icing for its Great Plains Area Office in Rapid City, South Dakota, under an Indian small business set-aside. The Forest Service is buying parking lot snow removal and ice mitigation for the Lake Tahoe Basin, an office in Washington, D.C. needs its grounds cleared, and an agency in Nebraska is setting up a blanket purchase agreement for snow removal and hauling, which means repeat work over the winter rather than a single storm.

Kansas has a statewide snow and grounds notice at the sources-sought stage, the point where an agency asks who out there can do the work before it writes the solicitation. That is the best moment for a new contractor to introduce the business, because the agency is still deciding how to structure the bid and whether to set it aside.

Every one of these notices is listed, with its deadline and set-aside, on the snow removal page at UX Contract, and each one links to the official notice on SAM.gov. The page updates twice a day, so the list above will have changed by the time the first storm hits, and the page will have changed with it. There is a state-by-state version as well, so a plow operator in Michigan sees Michigan first.

What the government paid last year

Snow plowing sits inside a federal industry code called Other Services to Buildings and Dwellings, NAICS 561790, which also covers pressure washing, gutter work and similar exterior services. In fiscal year 2026, federal agencies obligated $51.0 million in that code across 764 awards, according to USAspending.gov. The Department of Defense was the largest buyer at $31.0 million, with the Department of Veterans Affairs at $10.5 million and the Treasury at $8.7 million. Those are the agencies with the most buildings to keep open in winter, and they buy the same service every year.

The individual awards tend to be modest, which is exactly why they suit a small operator. A regional VA medical center or an Army Reserve center buys snow removal by the season, often under a multi-year agreement with option years, and the incumbent has to win it again when it comes up. UX Contract's awards search shows who holds those contracts today and what they were paid, which is the clearest picture a new bidder can get of the going rate.

The truck that does the work: a Ford F-350 with a plow

Walk through any municipal yard in January and the truck you see most is a Ford F-350 Super Duty with a plow on the front and a spreader or a liftgate on the back. Government fleets buy them by the dozen, run them hard for eight to twelve winters, and then sell them at auction, usually with the plow still mounted and the hydraulics still working. For a contractor pricing a first federal bid, that is the equipment at the lowest possible cost of entry.

A white Ford F-350 4x4 regular cab with a yellow snow plow mounted on the front, driver side

UX Search finds every government auction platform at once, so a search for a plow truck pulls in GovDeals, Public Surplus, Municibid, GSA Auctions and the state surplus sites together, sorted by closing time. A narrower search for a Ford F-350 shows the trucks themselves, plow or no plow, and the listing page for each one shows the similar trucks that already sold, so the bid you place is grounded in what the last buyer paid. The Price Report does the same across the whole archive, with the real hammer prices by month.

A government plow truck comes with a history that is easy to read if you know where to look. The agency's name is on the door, the listing usually says how many miles and sometimes how many engine hours, and the photos show the plow frame, the liftgate or spreader, the light bar and the rust line along the rocker panels, where a decade of salt leaves its mark. Our guide to government service trucks at auction walks through the points that matter on a Super Duty, and the plow itself is worth a close look: a Western, Boss or Fisher plow with a working pump is a significant part of the truck's value.

The same Ford F-350 from the passenger side, with the plow raised and the salt pile behind it

The rear of the Ford F-350 with a G2 liftgate, amber light bar and a tow hitch

From a truck to a contract, in order

The path from an auction win to a federal invoice is shorter than most people expect, and UX Contract covers each step in plain English. Registration in SAM.gov is free and takes a few weeks, so it is the first thing to do; the SAM registration guide explains the Unique Entity ID and the CAGE code and what the government is actually asking for on the form. The set-asides guide explains why seven of the eight open snow bids are limited to small businesses, veteran-owned businesses and tribal businesses, and how to tell which ones you qualify for. The bid checklist and the pricing worksheet turn a snow removal solicitation into a number, with the truck, the operator, the salt and the hours per event all accounted for.

State and local governments buy far more snow removal than the federal government does, and a growing number of them publish their bids as open data. The state and local bids page on UX Contract lists the ones we can read directly from the governments that publish them, with city and county notices alongside the federal ones.

One page for the whole season

The UX Network now connects these sites to each other on the page. The snow removal contracts page on UX Contract shows the plow trucks and salt spreaders closing soonest at government auction, with photos. A plow truck listing on UX Search shows the snow removal bids due this week. This article shows both. A contractor can read about the Beckley VA contract, see the F-350 that could do the job, check what the last one sold for, and come back to the bid deadline, without leaving the network, and every one of those pages is free.

Members who want to track the season rather than check it by hand can keep the saved searches, the bid deadlines and the auction closing times together in UX Console, which sends the alerts so the contractor can be out plowing. Everything else, from the first search to the last sold price, is open to everyone.