It’s no secret that this industry got a boost from the pandemic. The CEO of Taiga Building Products, the giant national distributor, told Hardlines that his company’s investments in tech were especially well timed.
Russ Permann says that Taiga’s “pretty significant investment” in its enterprise warehouse management system was “fortuitous,” coming to completion right before the pandemic began.
“We started the process of automating our facilities in 2015. We went live on our last system (a system provided by Major Data, which had been acquired by Epicor) and completed that just before the pandemic. I mean it was February 2020 that we completed it. Just in the nick of time, really. That [system] was an acquisition that we had made in 2018.
“What Covid really did, was accelerate us on this curve of really leaning into these tools more. And we definitely got more granular in the data, looking at our performance metrics more… If there was a ray of sunshine to come from the pandemic, that would be it for me.”
This story is excerpted from a larger article that appears in the 2nd Quarter issue (mailing April 7) of our trade magazine Hardlines Home Improvement Quarterly. HHIQ is mailed free-of-charge to 11,000 dealers and managers across the country and is $90 per year for suppliers. To get your own subscription, click here now.
