Disclosing Number of Responses

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A question for buyers: Should/Do you disclose how many responses you received to a particular solicitation if asked? ie if you provide a debriefing to an RFP and the vendor asks 'how many proposals did you get', do you or should you tell them?

In past, some buyers would say 'no', there is no reason to disclose this information and in a situation where you only had 2 or 3 responses, might the vendor then start pushing to find out who the competition were and/or fight for extra points?

My thought - tell them the number - you don't need to give any further details unless your Freedom of Information Act requires it...and if it does require you to disclose the other details, why fight it?

In the late 90s/early 2000s I found we had dozens of responses - ie I would get no less than 7, but on average 14 responses to 'average' RFPs - and a whole lot more for prequalification processes. However, as time went on, I found in the mid 2000s the response rate dropped and in some cases I was lucky to get 4 responses to an RFP.

Now in the past 1-2 years, those numbers are back up again, and we're finding people/firms that never used to respond to RFPs are doing so now. The economic climate has changed and people are trying new avenues of business...

So, back to the original question, should you disclose the number of responses? I think this might provide vendors with a context as to how competitive their market is. In the mid-2000s a firm may have won a significant number of contracts and are now scratching their heads as to why they aren't winning them now...in all likelihood, they had less competition and now everyone has jumped onto the bandwagon...better for them to understand how the RFP marketplace has changed than for them to blame the process...