From $1K to $7.5M – Shunquanna’s Path to Rock Government Contracting Space

If you’re a contractor, it’s common to hear about governments awarding massive contracts worth millions or even billions of dollars. While these headlines grab attention, they can sometimes lead newer contractors to overlook smaller opportunities that are crucial for building a strong and credible track record.

Sometimes, people look at a $1,000 contract and just skip it since it doesn’t look sexy enough. However. But think about it: how often do people make $1,000 quickly, without relying on luck like gambling or lottery tickets? It’s rare — and it’s worth recognizing.

This is the story of Shunquanna “Q” Woolard, CEO and Founder of R.S. Woolard Specialty Services L.L.C. She was thrilled about her first $1,000 government contract, as it allowed her to gain valuable experience. Even more exciting, that initial contract opened the door to many opportunities and led her to secure larger and larger contracts.

Yes, we’re talking about her leap from a $1,000 contract to $7.5 million in government contracts. But before diving into the philosophy behind that incredible jump, we need to take a step back and look at her early days in the government contracting space.

A Veteran’s Journey Into Government Contracting

Shunquanna “Q” Woolard’s journey into government contracting began in 2023, but the seeds were planted much earlier. As a young woman, she joined the Air Force at 18 and deployed to Iraq by the age of 20. While stationed on bases and during deployments, she frequently heard about contractors but never fully understood what that world entailed.

After her military service, she transitioned into a nursing career with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), working at several VA hospitals. Even then, she worked alongside many contract nurses and medical staff but still hadn’t explored government contracting herself.

Her path took a turn when COVID-19 hit. At the time, she had left the federal government and was working in the private sector as a clinical supervisor in senior living. The pandemic brought overwhelming burnout, and Shunquanna found herself doing everything from caregiving to maintenance work to help her short-staffed team. Despite efforts, COVID eventually reached their building, which marked a physically and emotionally exhausting period in her career.

“My husband and I had always been talking about how we have to figure out what the next thing is — we’re pretty burned out with what we’re doing. My husband has been a master barber for over 30 years, and so the standing up on his feet and everything — it’s like, ‘Okay, what do we want to do here?’ We were like, ‘You know, we’re going to start a business,’ and we had never really sat in that conversation,” she recalled.

At the time, everything was just ideas — there was no action. It wasn’t until this event that her life truly changed.

After the pandemic, wanting to stay close to healthcare but step away from bedside work, she moved into an operations role. It was during training for this new position that she met a fellow veteran who casually revealed he ran a government contracting business on the side. Their military bond led to deeper conversations, and he introduced her to the idea of running a small business in the contracting space.

That conversation sparked something in Shunquanna. She realized that government contracting had always been around her — during her time in the military, at the VA, and even in her everyday conversations with colleagues — but she had never connected the dots. That moment reignited her interest, and she shared her discovery with her husband.

From the shared interest, they decided to seriously explore government contracting as a business opportunity — a move that would soon reshape their future.

“Long story short, going back to that conversation with the gentleman, he reignited my interest. I came home, I talked to my husband about it, and I said, ‘I’m going to start looking into this government contracting thing — this may be a good small business opportunity,’” said Shunquanna.

And that’s how her company — R.S. Woolard Specialty Services — was born!

The Initial Phase – Learn Everything She Could, Stay Flexible, Take action, and Figure it Out as she Went

In the initial phase of her government contracting journey, Shunquanna embraced a self-taught, action-driven philosophy rooted in adaptability and persistence. She turned to YouTube to educate herself.

By late 2023, Shunquanna was deep in the process of registering her business on SAM.gov, carefully following the step-by-step guidance she’d picked up YouTube.

She tackled the SAM registration process diligently—making phone calls to clarify issues, ensuring all her documentation matched exactly, and learning the importance of aligning EIN and address information to avoid delays.

Early on, she believed certifications were a prerequisite to bidding, so she pursued and obtained her Service-Disabled Veteran-Owned Small Business (SDVOSB) certification. However, once she saw others in the Facebook group winning contracts, she realized she could start where she was.

With no clear niche, Shunquanna took a broad approach—bidding on everything she thought she could handle, regardless of NAICS code.

“And so I ended up applying for quite a few things, and then in my mind, I could do everything that I saw on SAM, right — all of these solicitations — I was all over the place. Like, I wasn’t going after one NAICS code, I was just all over the place,” Shunquanna shared.

She and her husband initially pursued construction-related contracts, taking time off their 9-to-5 jobs to attend site visits and connect with subcontractors, but soon realized that industry wasn’t a practical fit.

Pivoting quickly, she shifted to a catering opportunity, “I actually went in another direction, and I ended up winning my first contract, believe it or not, it was for catering. I went from concrete to catering,” she stated.

This pivot had led her to secure her first contract with a National Guard unit in Alabama. It was a small catering job – about $1,000 in profit, but for Shunquanna, it was a deeply meaningful milestone.

“Now I’ll be honest, the walk away profit from that was maybe about $1,000, but I’m telling you I was so happy about that $1,000,” she expressed.

Shunquanna received her CAGE code on December 23, 2023, and won her first catering contract around the end of February 2024. This means she secured the contract within just three months of starting her venture into government contracting. Even better, the National Guard was so impressed with the catering services Shunquanna provided the first time that they proactively reached back out to her in December 2024.

From Catering to Leasing – How Did Political Changes Affected Her Business?

After winning her catering contract, Shunquanna decided to explore a new niche: government leasing through the GSA. She pursued a solicitation for a small, 600-square-foot office space near Spanish Fort, Alabama, which she found fascinating because few in the government contracting space were talking about it.

 “Okay, I don’t hear people talking a lot about leasing in the government contracting space. This seems like something that I could probably manage, so let me go after it,” she shared.

She identified a suitable 1,200-square-foot commercial property through LoopNet and pitched it despite the size difference. Working closely with the real estate agent and the property owner—who allowed her to act as an authorized agent—she helped him get registered in SAM.gov and prepared the property for a potential 15–20 year lease for the SBA.

GSA was impressed and engaged her throughout the process, even requesting modifications to the lease terms (e.g., classifying 600 square feet as free space).

However, political changes and a shift in administration led to massive staffing cuts, including her GSA contact being placed on administrative leave.

She recalled, “Well, unfortunately, we had this whole change of administration when we ended up getting the new president and everything. So, when everything changed over—and you know GSA was one of the first agencies that was hit—we hadn’t even moved into our space yet. So, we were literally chopped off.”

The lease process stalled, and though she was told the project was reassigned, communication lagged. To avoid leaving the landlord in limbo, she advised him to lease the space short-term until more clarity emerged. While she isn’t actively pursuing leasing right now due to the instability within GSA and limited opportunities, she remains open to it once the environment stabilizes.

“I would go back to for sure. I’m just waiting for the smoke to clear a little bit,” she said.

From Leasing to Lodging – How Did Shunquanna Overcome Pricing and Financing Challenges?

After the situation of the leasing contract, Shunquanna soon turned her attention to lodging contracts.

Drawing on her 13 years of military experience, she recognized a familiar need when the Army National Guard in New York posted a solicitation for lodging during drill weekends. Confident in her ability to secure hotel rooms and create room blocks, she took swift action.

Without the time to reach out to hotels or ask clarification questions (she found the notice less than 48 hours before it closed), she relied on her knowledge of military travel logistics.

“I know that when you are on active duty you get a per diem rate, a daily per diem rate, you get the lodging rate as well as the rate you know to eat,” she said.

She used the GSA per diem tool, a public federal resource listing approved lodging and meal rates by location, to build a cost model that aligned with what the government was accustomed to paying. She included only a modest 8% profit margin — not to maximize revenue, but to build her track record.

“I only put like a small profit; I want to say it was around about 8% profit because again I was just trying to build a track record. I wasn’t really focused on the profit because I knew that at some point it would come,” she explained.

Just three days after the proposal closed, she received an award email — and was tasked with securing over 240 hotel rooms in under two weeks. She hadn’t contacted the hotels in advance but used the GSA rates as a pricing anchor, showing the agency she understood the constraints and could execute quickly.

Shunquanna successfully secured lodging for over 240 service members by strategically coordinating with 9–10 different hotels in upstate New York during peak travel season. Despite limited availability, she leveraged her understanding of the military per diem system to negotiate rates and confirm compliance with government pricing.

Some hotels were fine with delayed payments (waiting for her to get paid by the government), while others required immediate payment — which presented a cash flow issue.

Since her factoring company (which usually buys invoices after work is done) couldn’t help in the traditional way, they got creative. They partnered with another lender who fronted her the money just in time — on Wednesday night — for Friday check-ins. That allowed her to use her business credit card to secure the hotel bookings.

Everything was going smoothly — until Saturday morning. She got an early call from a commander: one of the hotels, housing 80–90 people, had a gas leak.

With the Army National Guard demanding an update by noon, she immediately began calling nearby hotels, working tirelessly for four straight hours to relocate all 45 rooms. Despite already facing tight margins, she prioritized mission success over profit.

“This dug into my profit, but at that point, I didn’t care about the money. I just wanted to have a successful contract. I didn’t want to hear about bad reports or anything. I just needed to make it happen,” she expressed.

The Leap from $1,000 to $7.5M – It’s Time to Negotiate for Profitability

It seemed like the initial contracts had prepared her for something big. Each one—whether it was catering, leasing, or lodging in New York—taught her something new and steadily built her confidence. But nothing quite compared to what came next.

Just 30 to 40 days later after the gas leak situation in New York, in November 2024, she won a 5-year multiple award Blanket Purchase Agreement (BPA) for lodging at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska

The agreement allowed for up to $7.5 million per call order, a scale far beyond anything she had handled before.

Motivated by the win, she repurposed the winning proposal template—adjusting images and content—and applied it to 14 more lodging BPAs. She’d also enrolled in a proposal writing course, where she learned how to enhance proposals with visuals, such as hotel photos and AAA/star ratings—important criteria often overlooked in solicitations.

By January 2025, her strategy paid off. She landed a second BPA, which already issued its first call order just two weeks before this reflection. This one supports the National Guard’s drill weekends and guarantees at least nine call orders per year, providing consistent income.

Around that same time, the agency managing the Alaska BPA reached out to her with a lodging request. That was the moment she had hoped for—they were ready to place a call order under the $7.5 million ceiling. She was ecstatic. She reviewed the number of rooms and check-in details, then began securing hotels in Fairbanks, Alaska, using the GSA website and her local contacts.

While pulling everything together, she discovered something unexpected: Fairbanks hotel prices and per diem rates fluctuate by season. That wasn’t something she had planned for. After running the numbers and consulting with her factoring team, she realized her initial pricing might have been too low for the level of service required.

“As we went through everything, I realized I may have priced myself too low given the amount of work involved—especially when I thought back to how things went in New York. By that point, I had already locked in most of the rooms in Fairbanks, so my team advised me to go back and request a pricing adjustment,” she said.

Rather than pushing forward at a potential loss, she decided to negotiate. She sent an email requesting to speak with a decision maker about revising her pricing. To her surprise, within 45 minutes, she got a response asking her to simply send the updated rates. She submitted her revised proposal, and just two hours later, she received a new contract with the updated pricing.

She wasn’t able to proceed with the second contract due to some political changes. However, the change in administration doesn’t mean it’s the end for government contractors. Shunquanna is a great example— so far, she has successfully secured two BPA contracts by now, both during President Trump’s administration.