Pro Tips: How to pick your inventory

Picking the right inventory for your customer's can take a lot of thought and intention. You want to have products that are fresh, exciting, but also applicable to the types of repairs your technicians are doing day-to-day. We've talked to a handful of seasoned distributors about how they pick their inventory, here's what they said.

2. Stock your truck for your route

Smallman Tools multi-route owner, Nick Smalley, describes how they keep their five trucks stocked.

"Our inventory is picked per the route. So, all five of our trucks are stacked a little bit differently. For instance, Jimmy's truck, he may sell 50 boxes of rubber gloves a week because his shops aren't supplied with rubber gloves, whereas I don't sell any, because all my shops, their rubber gloves are paid for by the shop. So, every truck is stocked based on the route."

—Nick Smalley, independent distributor 

3. Use your experience 

"When I'm walking through shops, I look and see what the master techs have lying around or what they're using. I rely on social media, or I look through my own toolbox, and I see what I had a good start with, and that's what I try and incorporate into my inventory. It makes it even easier for me to talk about because I've used it before."

—Collin Kenehan, independent distributor