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Government · head to head

Bonfire vs Very Good Security

Bonfire logo

Bonfire

Government

Public sector sourcing and bid evaluation software with scored, auditable award decisions

From
On request
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite
Very Good Security logo

Very Good Security

Cybersecurity

Tokenisation proxy that keeps card and personal data out of your own systems and out of PCI scope

From
$1000/month
Free plan
No
Full reviewWebsite

The short version

  • Each has a real cost: Bonfire it is a sourcing and evaluation tool rather than full procure to pay, so requisitions, purchase orders and invoicing stay in the finance system and the join between them is the agency's problem.; Very Good Security vGS sits in the live path of every request carrying sensitive data, so its latency and availability become yours, and an outage in the proxy is a payment outage no matter how healthy your own systems are.
  • They diverge on capability: Bonfire covers Solicitation posting, Very Good Security covers Aliasing proxy.
  • Prices and features above were last checked on 31 August 2026.

Where they differ

Only the attributes on which Bonfire and Very Good Security actually diverge.

Attributes where Bonfire and Very Good Security differ
AttributeBonfireVery Good Security
Starting priceOn request$1000/month
Pricing modelquotePer month
PlatformsWebWeb, API
CategoryGovernmentCybersecurity

Identical on both: free tier (No), user rating (Not yet rated).

What each one covers

Drawn from each product's published feature list. An absence here means we hold no record of it - not that the product lacks it.

Only in Bonfire

  • Solicitation posting
  • Sealed submission intake
  • Scored evaluation workspace
  • Audit trail
  • Supplier portal
  • Requirement matrices

Only in Very Good Security

  • Aliasing proxy
  • PCI scope reduction
  • Network tokenisation
  • Processor optionality
  • Card issuing data
  • Vault and access controls
  • Data residency options
  • Compliance artefacts

What people use each for

The jobs each tool is most often brought in to do.

Bonfire

  • An agency that has lost or nearly lost a bid protest and needs a defensible evaluation recordnot Very Good Security
  • A procurement team running scoring committees currently held together by spreadsheets and emailnot Very Good Security
  • A university or health system applying public procurement rules without a public procurement systemnot Very Good Security
  • An agency wanting suppliers to self register and receive addenda automatically rather than by mailing listnot Very Good Security

Very Good Security

  • A marketplace facing its first PCI DSS Level 1 assessment that wants to keep card data off its own estate rather than harden a dozen servicesnot Bonfire
  • A merchant negotiating with a second acquirer that needs card credentials portable so the negotiation is real rather than theoreticalnot Bonfire
  • A fintech collecting bank account and identity documents that wants sensitive fields absent from logs, backups and analytics warehouses by constructionnot Bonfire
  • A card issuer that must display a full PAN in its own mobile app without the app or its backend touching cardholder datanot Bonfire

Where each one falls short

Documented limitations, not opinions. Every one is a constraint you would hit in normal use.

Bonfire

  • It is a sourcing and evaluation tool rather than full procure to pay, so requisitions, purchase orders and invoicing stay in the finance system and the join between them is the agency's problem.
  • Since the acquisition path from GTY to GI Partners to Euna Solutions, Bonfire sits in a portfolio alongside products it once competed with, which narrows a shortlist that appears independent.
  • Suppliers must register on the portal to bid, and small local vendors reliably complain about the extra account, which can reduce responses on low value solicitations.
  • Pricing is quoted rather than published and scales with solicitation volume, so an agency with a few very large procurements pays a model designed around throughput.
  • Contract management after award is thin compared with dedicated contract lifecycle products, so agencies often buy a second system for the obligations the award created.

Very Good Security

  • VGS sits in the live path of every request carrying sensitive data, so its latency and availability become yours, and an outage in the proxy is a payment outage no matter how healthy your own systems are.
  • Token portability is the whole selling point yet leaving VGS means migrating tokens back out, a project the vendor has no incentive to streamline, so the lock-in you removed from your acquirer partly moves to VGS.
  • Entry pricing at around one thousand US dollars a month is real money for a pre-revenue fintech, and it buys volume-limited throughput, so cost scales with exactly the growth that made you buy it.
  • Scope reduction is not scope elimination: your QSA still assesses how you integrate, and teams regularly discover that a support tool or an internal admin screen pulled plaintext back in and dragged systems into scope again.
  • Proxy-based interception constrains how you design request flows, and non-standard payloads, streaming uploads or binary formats often need custom routing rules that make debugging production issues noticeably harder.

Pricing, plan by plan

Bonfire

On request
  • Bonfire$undefined/year
    • Quoted by agency size and annual solicitation volume
    • Supplier side registration is free, which is how the vendor network grows
    • Implementation and training quoted separately from subscription

Very Good Security

$1000/month
  • Starter$1000/month
    • Aliasing proxy
    • Vault storage
    • PCI scope reduction
  • Growth$undefined/month
    • Network tokenisation
    • Multiple processors
    • Data residency options
  • Enterprise$undefined/year
    • Custom vault architecture
    • Dedicated support and SLA
    • Contractual compliance coverage

Which should you pick?

Choose Bonfire if

  • You need solicitation posting.
  • You also want sealed submission intake.
Bonfire review

Choose Very Good Security if

  • You need aliasing proxy.
  • You work on Web, API.
  • You also want pci scope reduction.
Very Good Security review

Questions people ask

Is Bonfire or Very Good Security better?
Neither clearly leads. Bonfire starts at On request and Very Good Security at $1000/month, and user ratings are close enough to be indistinguishable. Choose on capability and platform support.
Which is cheaper, Bonfire or Very Good Security?
Bonfire starts at On request and Very Good Security at $1000/month.
Does Bonfire or Very Good Security run on more platforms?
Bonfire runs on Web. Very Good Security runs on Web, API.
What is Bonfire best used for?
Bonfire is most often used for an agency that has lost or nearly lost a bid protest and needs a defensible evaluation record, a procurement team running scoring committees currently held together by spreadsheets and email, a university or health system applying public procurement rules without a public procurement system, an agency wanting suppliers to self register and receive addenda automatically rather than by mailing list. Of those, an agency that has lost or nearly lost a bid protest and needs a defensible evaluation record and a procurement team running scoring committees currently held together by spreadsheets and email are not what Very Good Security is typically brought in for.
What can Bonfire do that Very Good Security cannot?
Bonfire covers Solicitation posting, Sealed submission intake, Scored evaluation workspace, Audit trail. Very Good Security covers Aliasing proxy, PCI scope reduction, Network tokenisation, Processor optionality.

Answered from the vendors’ own pages

Bonfire: Who owns Bonfire?

Euna Solutions. Bonfire was acquired by GTY Technology in 2019, GTY was taken private by GI Partners in 2022, and the portfolio was rebranded Euna Solutions in 2023.

Very Good Security: Does VGS make me PCI compliant?

No. It removes cardholder data from your systems so your assessment covers a far smaller boundary, but you still complete an assessment and your integration is part of it.

Bonfire: Is it full procure to pay?

No. It covers sourcing and evaluation through award. Purchase orders and invoicing remain in the finance system.

Very Good Security: Can I move to another processor without re-collecting cards?

Yes, that is a core reason people buy it. The vault reveals stored credentials to whichever processor you route to.

Bonfire: What is the real value?

A defensible, time stamped evaluation record when an award is protested, which is the expensive failure mode in public procurement.

Very Good Security: What does it cost?

Published entry pricing is about one thousand US dollars per month; growth and enterprise tiers are quoted.

Bonfire: Can we see what other agencies pay?

Yes. These contracts are public records. Read several comparable awards before negotiating.

Very Good Security: Is it only for card data?

No. The proxy handles any sensitive field, including bank details, national identifiers and documents, though payments is where the product is now focused.

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