Zoro's growth came almost entirely from existing customers; AI is moving into quoting and orders

Grainger's Endless Assortment segment — its online-only businesses, Zoro in the US and MonotaRO in Japan — grew sales 19.3% in Q3 on a daily organic constant-currency basis (11.9% as reported, before adjusting for currency and last year's closure of Zoro U.K.). On the earnings call, management put Zoro U.S. sales growth at 25.2% on a daily basis and MonotaRO's at 13.6% in local days and currency. The detail worth studying is where Zoro's growth came from: Grainger's CEO said the acceleration came almost entirely from existing customers buying more, particularly small and midsize customers and individuals inside larger organizations.

Few results capture the AI-infrastructure buildout like Avnet's. The electronic-components distributor reported sales of $10.72 billion for its fiscal first quarter — up 81.7% as reported and about 71% excluding an extra week in the quarter — with demand led by data center, aerospace and defense, and networking. Its CEO said AI infrastructure spending is lifting demand beyond direct data-center sales, to the supporting semiconductors, connectors, passive components, and power technologies on a distributor's line card. Two caveats: part of the growth reflects higher component pricing, including memory, and Avnet's second-quarter guidance assumes supplier availability stays similar to this quarter's.