Yesterday, we wrapped up a fun and productive Fall Summit in Memphis, TN. The weather was perfect, Beale Street was awesome, and staying at the Peabody Hotel with their famous ducks was like going back in time with all the history that surrounded you.
I was writing this column that going “back in time” thought was top of mind. For many of us in the channel the rapid rate of change can often be overwhelming and make you wish for the good old days.
What the Fall Summit reminded me of and gave attendees is that:
Today is the Best Time to be in B2B Industrial Distribution
Why is today the best time to be in distribution? AI and technology put information at your fingertips that creates opportunities to move faster and take share from your competitors in record time. Taking significant market share was often a year’s long journey a decade ago, but today that significant share gain can be done in months versus years. The disruptions, uncertainties, and technology leaps (AI) give you the opportunity to help your great people spend less time executing orders and free up more time for them to serve your customers with real value. The more time you move from fulfilling orders to creating real value and more orders: the faster the share gain story will be for your business.
ISA’s Fall Summit program had three excellent tracks – Women in Industry (WII), Emerging Leaders (ELCC), and the Executive Network. The attendance at the event was sold out and every room was packed (I’m not sure on final number of attendees, but it was a record number for the event).
The speaker line-up was the who’s who from Industrial Distribution – Leaders from 3M, Vallen, Stanley Black & Decker, MSC Industrial, CRC, Grainger, Snap-On, US Tool Group, Stellar Industrial, WESCO, and many more channel leaders who presented on sales, leadership, and business planning topics over the 3 days. The content was fantastic, and the rooms were packed.
How can you tell that an Industry event is valuable?
Were the rooms full in the morning and the afternoon, were the functions packed, and was the crowd engaged? ISA got huge green checkmarks on all three areas. When people are getting value, they stay in the room and are engaged.
I’ll share a few more details on ISA’s new Executive Network track at the Summit as that is where I spent my time presenting a session and being a moderator for a second session.
ISA Executive Network Notes
Brendan Breen ISA CEO and the ISA team (along with help from Channel Leaders like Joyce Lansdale from Vallen) put together great sessions that were packed with research such as what is driving end customer preference, and where are potential perception gaps between Manufacturers/Reps, Distributors, and Industrial End Customers.
Many speakers shared behind the curtain looks at their strategy and execution programs. The sales tactics and strategies that the speakers shared were some of the best work, that I have seen presented and discussed at any event in recent memory.
The new ISA State of the Channel report was unveiled at the event. It’s packed with end customer research that I started in 2014 as distributor, so it has some unique channel and end customer trending data.
This State of the Channel report is the launch of some great content that they are developing that are exclusive to ISA members. So, naturally this first report is focused heavily on end customer trends and sales, but ISA will be adding much more specific research on pricing (SPAs), inventory, data analytics, AI, team configurations, and more for ISA and Executive Network members.
ISA new Executive Network is a huge step forward and the ISA team is going to be launching more exclusive research and content as part of this program. I am excited to see where ISA takes this great program in 2026 and beyond.
ISA put on a great event and raised the bar at their Fall Summit. I can’t wait to see what the team does with their three great programs (ELCC, WII, and Executive Network) to keep providing great content for the channel.
There is no time machine available to go back to the good old days, but 2026 is the best time ever to be an industrial channel leader. The opportunity to use technology and your people to go out and take share from the competition makes it the best time to be in the industrial channel ever.
As always, we appreciate your support and comments
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