Not so fast, new business models, tools and e-commerce capabilities are changing the distribution landscape at a breakneck speed. There’s much more to distribution than stocking such as customer service, relationships, culture, and technology.

Let’s take a look at how traditional distribution models will evolve over the next 5-10 years, particularly in the industrial materials segment:

Distributors who embrace the connected platform model will create a sustained advantage in the digital transformation age and the “cross-over” requires an architecture that is efficient for distributors to DIY. Digital transformation = channel connections + partnership ecosystem + platform technology.