News
All the latest reporting and analysis from Distribution Strategy Group.
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Genuine Parts Names Motion Leadership Team Ahead of 2027 Split
Will Stengel, currently chairman and CEO of Genuine Parts, will become chairman and CEO of Motion when the separation is completed. James Howe, a 30-year Motion veteran who has served as its president since 2024, was named president and chief operating officer, effective immediately.
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Three Years, No Progress: Why Distributor Sales Skills Haven’t Moved Since 2023
Three flat years of skill development isn’t bad luck. It’s what happens when a rep’s development and a manager’s guidance never turn into a habit on either side, meaning a repeatable, replicable process they both follow.
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Continental Battery Takes AI Into Core Sales Operations
The deployment extends AI beyond reporting and analysis and into day-to-day sales execution at Continental.
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MSC Industrial Ends 13-Month CFO Search with TopBuild Hire
Rob Kuhns will receive a $650,000 annual base salary. For fiscal 2027, he will be eligible for an annual incentive bonus targeted at 85% of his base salary, or $552,500, and an annual equity award with a target value of $1.5 million.
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Southern Glazer’s: Beverage Alcohol Growth Shifts to RTDs, Smaller Packages
For beverage distributors, the next phase of growth will depend increasingly on identifying which products are growing, which consumers are buying them and where those purchases are taking place.
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Distributors Build an AI Workforce as Hiring Moves into Core Operations
Distributors spent much of the initial generative AI boom testing tools, launching pilots and determining where the technology might fit. The next phase requires people who can connect those tools to actual distribution processes.
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Mountainland Supply Deploys AI to Cut Dead Stock Across 42 Branches
In Mountainland’s case, AI is being applied directly to inventory decisions that affect working capital, product availability, and profitability.
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Descartes Adds AI Warehouse Technology With $120 Million Extensiv Deal
AI increasingly is being incorporated into the systems companies already use to manage inventory, warehouses, transportation, and fulfillment, putting a premium on technology platforms with access to large volumes of operational data.
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Your Best People Are Retiring, But Your Best New Hire Is AI
The distributors, wholesalers and merchants that frame AI this way are already pulling ahead. The ones still running AI primarily as an IT project risk losing twice: first the people, then the knowledge they take with them.
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Crescent Electric Names Chief Supply Chain Officer
Kristee Mitchell, who joined Crescent in 2023, moved into the newly expanded role Aug. 31 after most recently serving as vice president of supply chain fulfillment.