In the January issue of Counterman , Columnist Gary Garberg writes about the tensions distributors and technicians experience when conducting day-to-day business with one another. They are on seemingly opposite sides of the fence in the aftermarket business, but according to Garberg, they may be better neighbors than they think.

Garberg writes about the opposing factors that create tension between distributors and technicians such as the distributor’s gross profit against the tech’s acquisition cost, the distributor’s expensive delivery service against the tech’s desire to have everything as fast as possible and the distributor’s exploding inventory cost against the tech’s demand for the distributor to have what he needs on the first call.

But, despite these differences Garberg says that both technicians and distributors want the same things. “We both want to sell quality parts that will fit right the first time and meet customers’ expectations for long life and trouble free operation. Neither one of us wants comebacks under any circumstances,” Garberg writes. “We share the desire for a level of service from our employees, in all areas of our operations, that will promote good service and earn the respect of our customers.”

Click here to read the full article on Counterman.com