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Border States
The distributor's major acquisition of Dominion Electric is just the latest piece in what has been a rapid 13-year expansion. Mike Hockett breaks down what Dominion adds to Border States and how it aligns with its growth history.

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Find deeper cybersecurity analysis, a case study on Motion, career advice from industry executives and best practices for knowledge transfer, talent management and more.

Market Insight Reports

The report features in-depth articles that recap the year that was 2023 in distribution dealmaking, a full rundown of every deal we covered in October-December, the latest EBITDA trading multiples and more.
Find a wealth of data and analysis extracted from the 3Q23 Baird-MDM Industrial Distribution Survey, including trending charts and figures for revenue and expectations, plus plenty of interesting commentary.
Find a wealth of data and analysis extracted from the 3Q23 Baird-MDM Industrial Distribution Survey, including trending charts and figures for revenue and expectations, plus plenty of interesting commentary.
Our 2023 third quarter M&A report features in-depth articles on activity by Ferguson and Veritiv, and chronicles the overall quarterly pace of new deals.
See MDM’s analysis of 2Q23 M&A activity pertaining to wholesale distributors, plus M&A financial benchmarks and recent Premium articles that had an M&A focus.
Audax Group, Boston, MA, has acquired UTEX Industries, Inc. Headquartered in Houston, TX, UTEX is a manufacturer of complex gaskets and highly engineered seals to oil and gas, water distribution, and industrial end markets.
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UTEX CEO Michael Balas will continue to lead the management team.
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Audax Group Co-CEO Geoffrey S. Rehnert says the firm, which invests in middle-market companies, wants to capitalize on positive trends in the energy market. Audax plans to grow the business by expanding into new markets and executing strategic add-on acquisitions.<br ...
Fenton Hord, head of Wolseley plc's U.S. building materials business, Stock Building Supply, will retire July 31, 2007.
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Hord will be succeeded by Joe Appelmann as CEO, who has been with the company for 18 years.
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Hord was with Wolseley for 20 years. When he was appointed CEO of the building materials arm in the U.S. in 1987, sales were $113 million. Revenues reached $5.3 billion in 2006.<br ...

State Industrial Products, Cleveland, OH, has acquired Ohio Soap Products of Parma, OH, a Cleveland suburb.

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Ohio Soap is a manufacturer and distributor of institutional ware washing equipment and cleaning products with $10 million in annual sales and 100 employees.
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Founded in 1911, privately-owned State Industrial Products has 1,200 employees and annual sales of more than $100 ...
Diversified industrial manufacturer Eaton Corporation, has acquired the technology and related assets associated with SMC Electrical Products, Inc.'s industrial medium-voltage adjustable frequency drive business.
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This acquisition complements Eaton's already strong position as a manufacturer of medium-voltage motor control products," said Randy Carson, Eaton senior vice president and president -Electrical Group. "By incorporating this product into our power distribution and control assemblies portfolio, we will be able to provide our customers with a comprehensive solution to address their motor starting needs."
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Eaton Corporation had 2006 sales of $12.4 billion.&nbsp ; Eaton has 61,000 employees and sells products to customers in more than 125 ...
Pearlman Industries, Inc., Commerce, CA, which was recently acquired by Harbour Group, has acquired Dimensional Tools, Inc., Dallas, TX.
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Dimensional Tools, based in Dallas, will become part of Pearlman's Keystone Tools division.

Dimensional Tools is a distributor of products for the stone fabrication market. It has locations in Dallas and Phoenix as well as a fleet servicing customers in the field.
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Pearlman Industries, Inc. is a supplier of diamond cutting products and abrasives to professionals in diverse end-markets, including stone, tile, construction, welding, and equipment rental. The company has two divisions: Pearl Abrasives, which develops branded abrasives and diamond products sold through distributors to a wide range of industries; and ...
Industrial production increased 0.7 percent in April after a decrease of 0.3 percent in March. Output in the manufacturing sector moved up 0.5 percent in April; the increase was led by advances in motor vehicles and parts and in high-technology goods.
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The output of utilities increased 3.5 percent; temperatures were relatively warm in March but fell below seasonal norms in April. Mining output decreased 0.3 percent in April. At 113.0 percent of its 2002 average, overall industrial production for April was 1.9 percent above its year-earlier level.
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The rate of capacity utilization for total industry rose 0.4 percentage point, to 81.6 percent, a level 0.6 percentage point above its 1972-2006 average.
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Market Groups
All major market ...
The U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development jointly announced the following residential construction statistics for April 2007:




Year-to-Date Percent Change (through April 2007)





<td style="BORDER-RIGHT: windowtext 1pt ...
Praxair, Inc., Danbury, CT, has agreed to buy a 50% stake in the industrial gases business of Yara International ASA of Norway.

The joint venture would initially include Yara's existing industrial gases businesses in Norway, Denmark and Sweden. The venture would operate under the name Yara Praxair AS and would be based in Oslo, Norway. The intentions are to establish the new company during the third quarter.

Yara generated annual sales of US$150 million in fiscal year 2006.

Combining the strong market position and name recognition that Yara enjoys in Scandinavia with Praxair's operational expertise and technology offerings, particularly in the areas of energy and environmental applications, creates a very compelling partnership," said Steve Angel, chairman ...

The Home Depot, Atlanta, GA, reported first-quarter profit of $1 billion, compared with $1.5 billion in the same period in fiscal 2006.
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Sales for the first quarter totaled $21.6 billion, a 0.6% increase from the first quarter of fiscal 2006. Total sales in the retail segment declined 4.3% to $18.5 billion, and comparable store sales declined 7.6%.

Total sales in the HD Supply segment grew by 46% to $3.1 billion, reflecting sales from acquired businesses. Organic sales were down 6.5%.
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The housing market continues to be a challenge, and erratic weather conditions across the United States negatively affected our spring selling season," said Frank Blake, chairman & CEO.
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Earlier this year Home Depot announced that it was conducting ...
HeidelbergCement AG, Heidelberg, Germany, has agreed to buy Hanson plc for about & pound; 8 billion (US$15.8 billion). The transaction forms the second largest building materials group worldwide.
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HeidelbergCement is one of the top producers of building materials worldwide, with its core products being cement, ready-mixed concrete and concrete products, aggregates, building materials and other products. It had sales in 2006 of & euro; 9 billion (US$12.2 billion).
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Hanson supplies heavy building materials to the construction industry, with sales of & pound; 4.1 billion (US$7.9 billion) in 2006. Its products fall into two categories: aggregates, which includes crushed rock, sand and gravel, ready-mixed concrete, asphalt and cement-related products; and building ...
Release taken from Statistics Canada.&nbsp ; All dollars are Canadian.

Canadian manufacturers had a strong March, following a slight increase in factory shipments in February, as previous supply disruptions caused by the rail strike and the refinery fire in Ontario were rectified.


In March, manufacturers shipped goods worth an estimated&nbsp ; $50.1&nbsp ; billion (Canadian), representing a&nbsp ; 2.8% gain over the previous month. For the first quarter, shipments were up&nbsp ; 1.0% compared to the fourth quarter of&nbsp ; 2006.

Using constant dollars, which take price fluctuations into account, the volume of shipments rose&nbsp ; 1.6% to&nbsp ; $45.1&nbsp ; billion, the fourth increase in five months.<br ...
Diversified industrial manufacturer Illinois Tool Works Inc., Glenview, IL, reported sales in many North American end markets continue to be weak.
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Sales for the quarter ended April 30, 2007, increased 15%. That included a 10% increase from acquisitions (minus divestitures), 2% growth from base revenues, and 3% from translation and other items.
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Sales in Engineered Products/North America were down 2% from the same period a year ago; Engineered Products/International sales were up 27%. Specialty Systems/North America sales were up 9%; Specialty Systems/International sales were up 21%.
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ITW is a $14.1 billion diversified manufacturer of highly engineered components and industrial systems and consumables. The company has 750 business units in 49 ...
Emerson, St. Louis, MO, has agreed to buy Stratos International, Inc., which will become part of Emerson Network Power. Emerson will acquire the company for about $85 million.
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The agreement broadens the scope of Network Power's offerings and strengthens the position of Emerson Connectivity Solutions in the $35 billion connector industry, particularly in the radio frequency (RF) sector.
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Emerson Network Power serves telecommunications networks, data centers, health care and industrial facilities with power solutions, including inbound power, connectivity, power supplies, power systems and precision cooling. Sales in fiscal 2006 were $4.4 ...
March U.S. manufacturing technology consumption totaled $371.1 million, according to AMTDA, the American Machine Tool Distributors' Association and the Association For Manufacturing Technology.
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This total, as reported by companies participating in the USMTC program, was up 34.9% from February, and up 1.4% from the total of $365.89 million reported for March 2006. With a year-to-date total of $945.27 million, 2007 was up 7.1% compared with 2006.


These numbers and all data in this report are based on the totals of actual data reported by companies participating in the USMTC program.
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The U.S. Manufacturing Technology Consumption (USMTC) report, jointly compiled by the two trade associations representing the production and distribution of ...

The Producer Price Index for Finished Goods increased 0.7 percent in April, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported.&nbsp ; This advance followed a 1.0-percent rise in March and a 1.3-percent increase in February.&nbsp ; In April, the index for finished goods excluding foods and energy remained unchanged for the second consecutive month.&nbsp ; At the earlier stages of processing, prices received by producers of intermediate goods rose 0.9 percent following a 1.0-percent increase a month earlier, and the crude goods index fell 1.5 percent after increasing 3.2 percent in March.

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Among finished goods, prices for consumer foods moved up 0.4 percent in April following a 1.4-percent increase in the previous month, while ...

As customer bases shift, competition intensifies and commodity prices seesaw, it's more crucial than ever for distributors to maximize profitability by magnifying the value they provide for their customers and not competing on price alone. Increasing prices by 1 percent without hurting volume can improve profits as much as 11 percent, according to one pricing consultant.

Distributors looking to boost profitability and refocus on value should analyze and redesign their pricing strategy.

"If a sales force is out negotiating deals, there's very little control. They come back and say, 'I've got a deal at $90. I know our price is $100, but if we don't give them $90 we won't get the deal.' And everyone feels as if they are being held for ransom, says ...

Distributors have had wildly varying degrees of success in updating their legacy systems. Service Oriented Architecture provides an opportunity to preserve the value of legacy systems but doesn't pigeon-hole a distributor into an exclusively Web interface or Windows-based application. It also allows your system to adapt to technology that has yet to surface. Here's an overview.

It's 2007 and legacy systems have beaten the odds. Here we are, still plugging away on our green-screen applications, improving them, expanding them and making them work harder than ever before. How did this happen?

Dozens of silver-bullet green-screen-to-GUI tools have wandered into and back out of the marketplace. Many conversions have been performed, but there have been wildly ...

Economic growth in the U.S. is sustainable throughout the remainder of 2007, say the nation's purchasing and supply executives in their spring 2007 Semiannual Economic Forecast. Expectations for the remainder of 2007 are encouraging in both the manufacturing and non-manufacturing sectors. These projections are part of the forecast issued by the Business Survey Committee of the Institute for Supply Management& trade; (ISM).

Manufacturing Summary
The survey panel of purchasing and supply management executives remains optimistic with 62 percent of respondents predicting revenues to be greater in 2007 than in 2006. This is reflected in their expectations of a 5.6 percent net increase in revenues for the period. To support the revenue growth expectations, ...


March 2007 sales of merchant wholesalers, except manufacturers'sales branches and offices, after adjustment for seasonal variations and trading-day differences but not for price changes, were $346.3 billion, up 1.8 percent from the revised February level and were up 8.4 percent from the March 2006 level. The February preliminary estimate was revised downward $0.6 billion or 0.2 percent. March sales of durable goods were up 2.1 percent from last month and were up 6.6 percent from a year ago. Compared to last month, sales of computer and computer peripheral equipment and supplies were up 6.1 percent and sales of lumber and other construction materials increased 5.9 percent. March sales of nondurable goods were up 1.5 percent (+/-0.7%) from last month and were up 10.1 percent (+/-2.0%) ...

Investment Banking Directory

Work with a banking partner that knows your business. Get detailed information on investment banks with expertise in the wholesale distribution industry.

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