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“Transforming the Wholesale Distribution Industry” - see naw.org

You may not be familiar with the NAW - the National Association of Wholesaler Distributors. Or you may just feel that a quite large association with some quite large member companies offers little of interest to the independent distributor. So let’s just take a minute to frame a picture of the NAW at work in service of you meeting your goals.

The big picture for the NAW is to lead in four areas:

advocacy
collaboration
education
innovation

While this true and all are interesting, I am going to cut to the chase and address innovation because we all at some level know that innovation is key to long term success, if not to survival itself. I am an NAW member, by way of the MAW, the sponsor of this blog. I recently spent a few minutes on the NAW site for the purpose of looking for specific support, in the area of innovation, for the independent business. I quickly found sources of instructive background and NAW partners available to provide service.

Under Business Solutions: NAW Business Solutions is a group of services providers who have partnered with NAW to offer service that can drive growth and profit. There are nine areas - with one being Freight. Here you can find text and video about a company called MemberFreight.com and its innovative and comprehensive system for managing your freight. There are going to be a lot of distributors who don’t much about this and can atleast gain product knowledge to factor into their plans for better service at lower cost.

Under Digital Warehouse: A connunications tech company called Mobilico is the sponsor of a video about providing service to independent contractors. This video leads with interesting market research from coveringthe needs and challenges of characterizing the distributor to contractor relationship - and how that points to strategies. Excellent content.

Under Webinars: A sales tech company called SPARXiQ (analalytics, operations, training) is the sponsor of the webinar “Mastering Proce Overrides for Enhanced Profit Margin.” This is an example of how the NAW package stretches from high level strategy to optimizing profit with an everyday tactic.

Under Business Solutions (again): An automation company called Unified A/R is the NAW Business Solutions partner for accounts receivable and payment acceptance solutions. It may be that innovation to you means advancing in this area, and here is a place to start the research.

Under Education: The NAW has AI capability called NAW Nucleus that is “puts decades of NAW and MDM expertise at your fingertips.” You are invited to begin exploring right now. Nucleus is tailored to the distribution, meaning this AI system is better position to produce the most relevant insights for you, the distributor.

What’s Next? The NAW site is brimming with assistance and ideas for you. Some free. Some not. As an existing NAW member, MAW may be able to get you eligible for some member access and pricing. You would need to become a subscriber-member her at MAW - click the button in out footer.

We should continue the NAW discussion with a focus on its substantial publications offerings (strength in strategy) and maybe another time as well on its delivering the wisdom of industry leaders to your doorstep.

2- NAW: How this national association can help the independent distributor run its business better

3- Public Company Sample

1 - Meet the Big 50 from Industrial Distribution’s Survey