The distribution divide is now data centers versus the rest.

The AI infrastructure buildout has become a line-item mover for distributors with the supply-chain depth to serve it. Wesco reported Q2 data-center sales of about $1.5 billion, up 45% year over year, inside record total sales of $6.7 billion, up 13%, and a record backlog. The telling part is the dual posture: Wesco is selling into AI-driven demand for power, cabling, and connectivity while deploying AI internally to compress lead times.

On the buyer side, AI is no longer an experiment. In Gartner's latest surveys, 45% of B2B buyers said they used generative AI during a recent purchase—primarily to research vendors and products—and buyers now consult an average of seven information sources before they ever engage a seller.

The largest U.S. building-products distributor is in the harder half of the Q2 divide. Full-year 2025 sales fell 7.4% to $15.2 billion, and Q1 2026 sales dropped 10% to $3.3 billion. The response is instructive: roughly $100 million in cost actions and 21 facility consolidations, share gains through bundled offerings, and an aggressive digital push—a target of $1 billion in digital sales by the end of 2026 through its myBLDR.com platform.

On the other side of the ledger, landscape-supply distributor SiteOne grew digital sales more than 120% in 2025 while total sales rose 4% to $4.7 billion and net income climbed 23%. Management’s consistent message: customers who engage digitally grow their business with SiteOne significantly faster than those who don’t, helping expand share and lift gross margin.

SiteOne used its June investor day to target $7–8 billion in sales by 2030—a 50–70% jump from $4.7 billion in 2025—via acquisitions, AI, digital commerce, pricing technology, and private label. The signal for the sector: advantage is increasingly driven by technology rather than branch count, and independents without comparable digital capability face mounting pressure, especially among small and midsize customers.