Distribution Talk

Yates Hudson wasn't looking for a second act. After 32 years with the same company, he got one anyway. Yates owes his successful pivot to general manager at Phoenix Fastener & Supply, a division of Birmingham Fastener, to an interest in roles beyond the IT department for which he was hired fresh after graduation and networking outside the company.

Jason chats with Yates about building a career in distribution one position at a time and cultivating meaningful relationships along the way.

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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: INxSQL Distribution Software, integrated distribution ERP software designed for the wholesale and distribution industry.

Trust. It's a quality that's difficult to quantify but impossible to do business without. What differentiates good from truly great distributors is their ability to cultivate trust on a sales call, at the counter, and anywhere there's a customer-centric interaction.

Natalie Doyle Oldfield specializes in helping organizations build, manage, and protect their trust equity. Her book The Power Of Trust and companion programs are essential guides for creating a culture of integrity. Jason caught up with Natalie to discuss the impact that authenticity and empathy have on a distributor's bottom line, plus best practices for improving trust at every phase of the customer journey.

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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: Profit2, helping distributors charge the right price.

Cory Anderson cracked the code on customer stickiness by writing his own rules. As president of M&A Supply based out of Nashville, this third-generation leader has gone all-in on providing a peak customer experience in the hyper-competitive HVAC vertical.

Jason caught up with Cory to discuss his company's technology journey, the goal-setting tool it relies on to manage growth, and why M&A invests in large-scale incentive trips, even when the bottom-line returns are difficult to quantify.

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***

Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

https://www.distributionteam.com

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: HMI Performance Incentives, providing innovative, data-driven B2B incentive solutions.

Implementing a new pricing strategy takes work. That's probably why many distributors avoid the project altogether. Worse, executives might invest big money in a pricing tool only to cut back on (or omit completely) supportive change management initiatives that ensure organizational endorsement.

Scott Sinning, CEO of Pricing For Distributors, has parlayed his corporate success into an entrepreneurial career designing custom pricing objectives to help wholesale distributors increase profitability. Jason and Scott met to discuss the philosophy behind creating tailored pricing advice and ensuring staff buy-in.

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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: Moblico, helping businesses do more business on mobile devices.

Raise your hand if your sales team still relies on spreadsheets to organize tasks, treating CRMs like glorified Rolodexes, and tracking changes to a client's buying pattern from memory. You're not alone.

Too many distributors are in the stone ages regarding their sales process, says Chris Van Ittersum, CEO of Workd, a cloud-based distribution software platform. Jason chatted with Chris about empowering sales teams and optimizing the client relationship via a single (and simple) data-driven management solution.

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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: Connected Peers providing virtual communities for wholesale distributors.

Like many next-gen trailblazers in the distribution space, Zac Jones, founder and CEO of PartsClub, grew up in the family business, surrounded by its potential and pain points. But rather than keep his success in-house, he's now offering an e-commerce platform for all, helping buyers and sellers connect virtually over quotes and orders without revenue-costing delays.

Jason caught up with Zac to learn more about how this transformative marketplace solution leverages the power of often insurmountable SKU data to enhance a distributor's reach and foster genuine customer interaction.

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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: INxSQL Distribution Software, integrated distribution ERP software designed for the wholesale and distribution industry.

Childhood interests don't often fuel "grown-up" careers. Enter Edward Boss, founder and CEO of Riteks, Inc., a chemical distributor in Houston, who parlayed his passion for chemistry into lucrative corporate positions and, eventually, a string of successful entrepreneurial endeavors.

Jason chats with Ed about the influence mentors have made throughout his career, the benefits of association membership, and the importance of encouraging the next generation of distribution leaders to explore STEM-related studies.

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***

Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: Profit2, helping distributors charge the right price.

You're not alone if you're having a tough time competing against the e-commerce giants. Susan Merlo, digital sales and marketing pioneer and creator of The Digital Distributor, urges CEOs to try a different tact: craft a relationship-focused persona online and power up the e-commerce and CRM assets they already have.

The shift can transform basic online selling into an engine for lead generation and customer loyalty. Jason chats with Susan about what distributors get wrong in marketing and sales, the risk-free rewards of automation, and creating a content-rich selling environment.

Susan Merlo is a Digital Sales and Marketing Consultant specializing in wholesale distribution. Her focus is on identifying growth opportunities for distributors by integrating digital sales and marketing solutions into their existing sales functions. Her strategies help distributors increase new and recurring sales, customer spend, customer retention, and profitability. Susan is the founder of Next Level iMedia and The Digital Distributor Program. Her book, "The Digital Distributor: Six Steps to Accelerate Sales," is a workbook-style guide that shows distributors how to build a strong digital foundation from which they can successfully communicate their value, manage, and convert more valuable leads, and serve their buyers on their buyers' terms. Learn more at https://www.thedigitaldistributor.com/.

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For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: Connected Peers providing virtual communities for wholesale distributors.

Robert Mayhew's success story is a case study for younger folks eager to create meaningful careers. As president of Mayhew Marketing Group, he's created a rep agency with a footprint that spans the entire Southwest. Jason chats with Robert about his enthusiasm for entry-level jobs, introducing the next wave of innovators to wholesale distribution's entrepreneurial opportunities, and the mentors who guided him to where he is today.

Robert encountered in the distribution world "some of the purest forms of entrepreneurship." This praise is from the "elder Millennial" innovator who made pizzas to pay for college before backing into a warehouse job with a STAFDA distributorship.

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Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: INxSQL Distribution Software, integrated distribution ERP software designed for the wholesale and distribution industry

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If change is the only constant, why do some leaders resist it at all costs? Jennifer Murphy, president of NetPlus Alliance, an industrial buying group based in Lockport, NY, embraces the transformative process, ditching long-standing methods to ensure the future health of her multi-generational family business. Jason caught up with Jennifer to learn more about NetPlus' culture of continuous improvement and how membership in a buying group benefits both the distributor and supplier.

Jennifer's exposure to the family business at an early age informs her attitude toward taking risks. "I saw how important it was to embrace change and the types of things you needed to do to be a much more progressive and competitive business."

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***

For full show notes and services visit: https://www.distributionteam.com

Distribution Talk is produced by The Distribution Team, a consulting services firm dedicated to helping wholesale distribution clients remove barriers to profitability, generate wealth and achieve personal goals.

This episode was edited & mixed by The Creative Impostor Studios.

Special thanks to our sponsor for this episode: INxSQL Distribution Software, integrated distribution ERP software designed for the wholesale and distribution industry