Every year utilities spend billions of dollars on energy efficiency / lighting rebate programs. In fact, one report states $7.8 billion! And estimates are that only $1-3 billion of this are for mid-stream (channel) rebates. And as Chris Cloutier, our […]
2016 seems to have been the “year of pricing”. A number of distributors either discussed, or undertook, pricing initiatives this past year. In many instances it was a desire to reverse an industry trend … eroding margins. Others recognized that if […]
As everyone knows, there has been much discussion regarding eCommerce and how it is “vital” for the survival of distributors. It’s essential to compete against Amazon. And small distributors (<$25M) are dinosaurs, destined to become extinct because of their inability […]
Only 30 days left in the year. And with all of the year-end things to do and possibly meetings you had to attend, many are just getting around to doing their 2017 planning … or at least sales forecasting. The […]
Many electrical and lighting distributors have devoted resources to marketing, selling and managing utility rebates to support their customers and as a differentiator to earning lighting retrofit projects. Frequently utility rebates are used to support LED sales. The rationale essentially […]
Recently a lighting rep who recently completed his first year at his firm, after spending six years in a variety of lighting manufacturer roles, shared his observations. The rep, Tom Salter, who works for SESCO Lighting, allowed ElectricalTrends to share […]
For the past 18 months NEMRA has been working with its NMG (NEMRA Manufacturer Group) to better understand the impact of the lack of industry standards to report point of sale (POS) and point of transfer (POT) between distributors and […]
Last week’s NAED 2017 Eastern Region Conference started the association meeting season with a whimper, albeit much of the “lack of energy” may not be attributable to NAED, especially given the need to book meeting space years in advance. The meeting […]
With Tuesday being Election Day, far be it from me, or a rep agency, to try to influence an election, but the debates have captured our attention. Living in a “swing state” I can say unequivocally that I am tired of […]
Over the past week we’ve been able to gain a sense of the distribution market with major distribution “networks” reporting quarterly performance. Last week we shared Rexel’s North American (and US) performance. Now we have insight from Graybar, AD and […]
