A lot of business leaders talk about “uncertainty,” but on today's episode, we talk about exactly where it comes from and how it hits your P&L.

We start with real-world takeaways from the recent convention in Nashville and conversations with distribution technology leaders, then connect the Middle East conflict to the Strait of Hormuz and other global supply chain choke points that quietly control fuel prices, freight capacity, and commodity availability. When that lane tightens, distributors feel it everywhere: inbound costs, delivery expense, lead times, and customer patience.

From there, we bring it back to the shop floor reality. Global growth forecasts are getting cut, manufacturing activity is shifting, and we’re watching an “inventory whip” as companies move away from "just in time" to "just in case."

Other topics discussed this week:

• Infor’s user event and executive conversations on platforms, data, and AI
• Global growth concerns and the inventory whip from just in time to just in case
• EU tariff deal implications, predictability, and questions on how tariffs get executed
• HVAC price-fixing lawsuit as a warning signal for market data sharing and pricing models
• M&A surge in distribution and the belief that scale helps weather volatility
• AI executive order delays, state-by-state regulation risk, and why that becomes a mess for multi-state operators
• Platform-first AI strategy, extensibility, and avoiding fragmented tools and fragmented data
• Robotics moving from novelty to real productivity and what it could mean in warehouses
• Grainger’s e-commerce performance, private label leverage, and what it signals for B2B competition
• Customer service as a loyalty driver, plus the current reality of bots that frustrate already-frustrated customers

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