Blog · Industry
Upload the sales sheet you already keep. Covirage maps every rep, route and store, shows where coverage is thin, and tells each rep which stores to visit and what to sell there.
How a distributor computes gross margin per account from invoice lines and cost, adds the cost to serve from delivery and returns, ranks accounts by margin rather than revenue, and finds the large accounts whose price agreements, delivery frequency and returns leave less than the small ones, with the identity that ties the account margins to the ledger.
16 Sept 20262 min readHow a distributor finds the accounts whose delivery frequency is out of proportion to their order size, from the delivery log and the invoice lines: drops per week against value per drop, the norm from accounts of the same size and type, the accounts on daily drops that similar accounts serve twice a week, the cost of the extra drops, and the offer that consolidates without losing the account.
16 Sept 20262 min readHow a distributor measures the share of each account's purchases that are its own private label against branded equivalents, from the invoice lines and the product master: penetration per account per category, the margin difference per line, the norm from accounts of the same type, the accounts buying branded where similar accounts buy own label and the value of the switch, and the identity that keeps own-label and branded revenue summing to the ledger.
16 Sept 20262 min readHow a distributor measures range per store against a channel-specific SKU list, values each gap at the store's own rate for similar SKUs, and turns the result into a three-line Monday brief per rep that names the store, the SKU and the number.
16 Sept 20263 min readHow a beverage or food distributor measures route coverage from the sales report it already runs: stores on the route, stores visited, stores that bought, range stocked per store, and the Monday list each rep should get.
16 Sept 20264 min readThe ten questions a distributor's commercial director puts to the branch and sales managers, which accounts are dormant and worth what, which branches leak category share, which accounts earn least after cost to serve, which take too many drops, which lines were lost to stock-outs, where is private label under-penetrated, which reps cover their books, what are the unagreed discounts, which counter customers deserve an account, and what changed, each with the table from the invoice lines and the delivery log, and the answer to send back.
16 Sept 20263 min readHow distributors should choose analytics software: start from the questions, check the data you hold, ask vendors ten questions, avoid the traps.
24 Sept 20264 min readCustomer profitability is reported at three levels that are often confused. Gross margin is revenue less the cost of the goods. Contribution margin takes off the costs the customer's own behaviour causes: deliveries, order handling, sales time, returns, rebates and credit. Net margin takes off a share of fixed overhead as well. This page sets out the three definitions, computes all of them for three customers, shows why the ranking changes at the contribution line and why it should not be taken further, and says which decisions each level is for.
17 Sept 20264 min readThe ten sales KPIs a wholesale distributor should run on, each with its formula, the export it comes from and what it tells you: account coverage at cadence, dormant accounts by prior value, category share against similar customers, contribution after cost to serve, price realisation, average drop value, order channel mix, fill rate and lost lines, customer concentration, and new account activation. Also the three measures most distributors miss, the vanity figures to drop, the identity behind each table, and who should own what.
17 Sept 20265 min readThe honest answer to what cost to serve a distributor or supplier should run per customer: the 8 to 15 percent of revenue figures quoted depend on which costs are allocated, on the driver used to allocate them, and on whether cost to serve is read against revenue or against gross margin. This page gives the ranges by desk, the three measurable things that set the right figure for one business, and the table to compute before anyone quotes a percentage.
17 Sept 20263 min readRoute coverage software for distributors. Every store your reps are not reaching, by Monday.
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