Product data readiness by distribution sector
Measured August 2026 · 37 distributors scored from a universe of 223 · edition 2026
The short answer
Product data quality varies more between sectors of distribution than between companies of different sizes within a sector, which is the opposite of what most people expect. Sectors selling technical, specification-driven products to buyers who filter on parameters tend to score higher, because their customers will not tolerate a catalog they cannot narrow. Sectors where purchasing runs through reps, contracts or replenishment rather than search score lower — the catalog was never the channel. Revenue is a weak predictor throughout: large distributors are not reliably better than smaller ones, and the highest scores in several bands belong to companies well outside the top ten.
Every group below is a median of measured scores with its sample size shown, and any group smaller than three companies is suppressed rather than published. Small samples are the norm here, so read these as directional rather than precise.
The comparison worth making is not who leads. It is whether your own sector scores low enough that ordinary competence would be a differentiator.
By sector
Median measured DRI. Groups under three companies are suppressed.
| Group | n | Median DRI | Highest in group |
|---|---|---|---|
| HVACR | 6 | 62 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Fasteners | 5 | 62 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Plumbing | 4 | 61.5 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Power Transmission & Bearings | 4 | 60 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Electrical, Data & Security | 6 | 58.5 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Safety | 6 | 58.5 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Industrial Supplies | 14 | 58 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| MRO Industrial | 7 | 58 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| JanSan, Packaging & Disposables | 7 | 58 | TricorBraun (70) |
| Specialty Adhesives | 3 | 58 | EIS Inc. (60) |
| Electronics | 5 | 57 | Future Electronics (68) |
| Fluid Power | 6 | 56.5 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| Plastics | 3 | 52 | E&T Plastics (68) |
| Gases & Welding Supplies | 5 | 46 | F.W. Webb (65) |
By business archetype
Archetype describes how a distributor competes, not what it sells.
| Group | n | Median DRI | Highest in group |
|---|---|---|---|
| Scale Aggregator | 14 | 59 | TricorBraun (70) |
| Branch-Density Operator | 9 | 58 | E&T Plastics (68) |
| PE Roll-Up | 4 | 56 | Veritiv Corporation (61) |
| Catalog-Native | 4 | 54.5 | Thermo Fisher Scientific (59) |
| Technical Specialist | 4 | 54 | Future Electronics (68) |
By revenue band
Scale is a weak predictor of catalog quality — the spread within each band is wider than the gap between bands.
| Group | n | Median DRI | Highest in group |
|---|---|---|---|
| $10B+ | 10 | 57.5 | W.W. Grainger (66) |
| $3B – $10B | 12 | 58.5 | Future Electronics (68) |
| $1B – $3B | 6 | 58 | TricorBraun (70) |
| Under $1B | 4 | 53.5 | The Master Group (60) |
Why sector predicts more than size
The pattern that holds across editions: catalog quality tracks how customers buy, not how large the company is.
Where buyers arrive with a specification and expect to narrow a catalog themselves, the catalog has to work, and it does. Where buying runs through a rep, a contract, a punchout or a replenishment schedule, the catalog is a reference rather than a channel, and it shows.
That has a strategic implication worth naming. In a low-scoring sector, ordinary catalog competence is a differentiator, because the comparison set is weak. In a high-scoring sector, the same investment is table stakes.
What a median hides
A sector median tells you where the middle of a group sits and nothing about the spread, which in several sectors is very wide. A single well-invested competitor can carry a sector median while everyone else trails it.
The same applies within a single catalog. The widest gap we measured between a distributor's best and worst category is large enough that a site-level average is close to meaningless as a management number — the categories that are failing are invisible in it.
Method, and how to check this
Every figure on this page is computed from the published dataset rather than written into the text, so it cannot drift from the measurement behind it. Scores come from live product pages sampled at each company, graded against a published framework. Groups with fewer than 3 measured companies are suppressed rather than published thin.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Digital Readiness Index?
A published framework scoring a distributor's live product pages on product data depth, buyer answerability, transparency and agent readiness. It is measured from public pages rather than self-reported, and the methodology is published in full.
Why are some sectors missing?
Any group with fewer than three measured companies is suppressed rather than published, because a median over one or two companies is not a benchmark.
Does company size predict product data quality?
Weakly. The spread within each revenue band is wider than the gap between bands, and the top scorer in several bands is not the largest company in it.
How often is this remeasured?
The index is remeasured on a recurring cycle and the measurement date is shown on every page. These tables are computed from the dataset directly, so they move when it does.