Market Sectors

RSS

In writing this column month after month, I recognize that while marketing insights and tips are helpful for many, a handful of folks don’t have the desire (or the time) to join in on their business’ marketing efforts. With this in mind, I wanted to think and “write outside the box” to focus on a topic applicable and relevant to all industry professionals and marketers alike. This topic is CREATIVITY.

While I’m not the first woman to be president of the American Supply Association, I am the first woman with the honor of attending the ASA Women in Industry ELEVATE conference as the ASA president —being the first woman to hold the role since the founding of the group in 2014.

For the second year in a row, 100% of Premier 150 Survey respondents reported an increase in sales in 2022 when compared to 2021. When it comes to projections for fiscal year 2023, 81% of these distributor respondent say sales will increase while 14% expect sales to remain the same and 4% anticipate a decrease in sales.

 Any business hoping to stand out in a competitive marketplace needs to find the one or two things it can do better than everyone else. Now celebrating 75 years in business, Industrial Valco has spent the last decade perfecting the craft it is known for – delivery speed and inventory availability - while honing in on a unique niche in the commercial and industrial PVF distribution worlds – marketing and branding.

With each passing year that the American Supply Association (ASA) Women in Industry Division holds it’s ELEVATE conference, it becomes more and more evident than the strength and representation of women in the PHCP-PVF supply chain is growing — much like the division itself.

The U.S. is currently experiencing the largest nursing staff shortage in history with no end in sight. Affecting health care facilities, nursing homes and assisted living facilities alike, lack of resources, ongoing patient care challenges, health and sanitation concerns along with simply being overworked, are all factors fueling this nursing shortage.

In April of 2022, ShowroomMarketing.com and The Decorative Plumbing and Hardware Association (the DPHA) agreed to put in motion an online-based, business development program for the residential plumbing distribution world.

At last year’s ASA Strategic Planning Retreat, volunteers discussed the idea of a “product data library” that could be the sole source of manufacturer product data to help enable distributors to compete against online-first, big-box retailers, and other nontraditional competitors.

I have participated in both U.S. and international codes and standards development for over 40 years and, although the process can be cumbersome, and, yes, a bit frustrating, I believe in the basic principles of consensus and due process which are the foundation of all valid standards and codes development processes.

With distributors now offering same and next-day delivery, online ordering and more value-add services than ever before, it’s sometimes hard to picture the humble beginnings many independent distribution businesses started from. For Craig Norlin, co-owner of Wautoma, Wisconsin-based Mid-State Supply, it’s not difficult to recall at all; he remembers his father — Austin Norlin — delivering product out of the family’s station wagon with a four-wheel farm wagon towing behind in the 1960s.