Building Value
Driving Wholesaler Returns Through
Strategic and Tactical Investment
Scott Benfield
“The concepts brought forth in this book are revolutionary in contrast to the current time-tested practices utilized in distribution. . . . The question is……will the successful adopters become so financially strong that the non-adopters eventually fall by the wayside?”
Jerry Lihota, P.E., CEO and Chairman of the Board, Rumsey Electric Company, Immediate Past Chairman of the Board, Electric Supply Division, Affiliated Distributors
“Building Value is a new look at an old industry. It is a comprehensive method to determine value for companies looking to improve or those looking to measure potential acquisition opportunities—a must read for owners.”
George Yezbak, COO, Murray Supply.
Building Value is a new release by Benfield Consulting that combines five years of field work and research into a comprehensive new approach for driving distributor profitability. Far more than an academic exercise, Benfield Consulting challenges much of the current approaches in profit-making and distributor practice including:
- Value is not a construct but a fundamental financial principal, used by top performing companies, that wholesalers should consider when driving shareholder value
- Rewarding sellers on margin dollars for commission or bonus often destroys value
- The use of financial accounting and concepts such as sales or margin dollars has a weak correlation with whether an investment generates an acceptable return
- Pricing done at the gross margin percent level often destroys value
- Cost-to-serve models, without demonstrable capacity measurement, can yield information that limits value generation
