Have you had a chance to speak your mind on the state of distribution today? A few weeks ago, MDM opened up our annual Market Trends survey seeking the input of distributors, manufacturers and service providers to the industry to identify critical trends and where the industry is headed in the near future. As I mentioned at the time, it is your opportunity to not only share your insights on the key challenges you see impacting your business for the coming year, but also to help focus MDM’s coverage of issues that matter most to you and your business. 

Here's a sneak peek at some of the responses we’ve been hearing so far. When we asked what your top company-specific concerns are for the near future, a word-cloud analysis of responses up to now features these terms:

• Margin
• Tariffs
• Growth
• Talent
• Customer
• Impact
• Profitability
• slowing

There’s definitely some tension evident in the air, judging from these top responses. Add your voice to the 10-minute survey to further help direct our research and industry coverage that matters to you most. As a bonus, by completing it, you will also be entered to win a $50 gift card.

We’ve been receiving some particularly compelling responses to the survey’s open-ended questions that seek out your top pain points, technological challenges and recruitment issues for your business. Here’s a sampling of representative responses we’ve received:

• “Record-low unemployment makes it tough to both find new workers and retain current talent.”
• “Reduction [in] regulation is having a strong positive impact. [We] cannot go backwards on this.”
• “Technology is changing products and systems much faster than customers’ understanding of the value of it.”

Thank you very much to those who have already participated in this important research. If you haven’t taken a few minutes to take the survey yet, please add your voice before we close the response period. Meanwhile, feel free to contact me, elizabeth@mdm.com, or CEO Tom Gale, tom@mdm.com, if you have any questions.