D&H Makes Midmarket/Enterprise Gains Versus Larger Competitors With Sales Up 27 Percent To Nearly $7B

‘We have matured to the point where we have gone upmarket and taken a large slice of that pie,’ says D&H Co-President Dan Schwab. ‘What is amazing is that for some vendors, we are becoming their No. 2 or No. 1 distributor. TD Synnex and Ingram used to be 10 to 20 times bigger than us. Now they are only three to four times larger in North America.’

Distribution powerhouse D&H Distributing said it finished its fiscal year ended April 30 with a 27 percent increase in sales to nearly $7 billion, including more than 30 percent growth in the midmarket/enterprise sales segment of the market.

“We have really become an incredible destination for midmarket and enterprise resellers that have become dissatisfied with service elsewhere and literally just didn’t know D&H existed,” said D&H Co-President Dan Schwab in an interview with CRN. “It is amazing how many partners were doing business with the incumbents because they felt they had to do business with them.”

D&H’s midmarket/enterprise business now makes up 36 percent, or $2.52 billion, of D&H’s annual revenue. In fact, 1,200 midmarket/enterprise partners now do business with Harrisburg, Pa.-based D&H every quarter.

Meanwhile, D&H has retained its stronghold in the SMB market with an SMB business that grew in the last fiscal year at a record 23 percent clip, Schwab said, noting that SMB remains the “foundation of D&H’s pyramid.”

Schwab said he sees D&H’s rise from a purely SMB stalwart into a midmarket/enterprise power as a “coming of age” story that has made D&H one of the big three distributors in North America alongside TD Synnex and Ingram Micro.

“Today it is really Ingram, TD Synnex and D&H,” Schwab said. “We are one of the big three. What I feel we have done is provide a choice for partners. We have matured to the point where we have gone upmarket and taken a large slice of that pie. What is amazing is that for some vendors, we are becoming their No. 2 or No. 1 distributor. TD Synnex and Ingram used to be 10 to 20 times bigger than us. Now they are only three to four times larger in North America. What’s more, we often have very similar revenue to them for the lines we carry.”

D&H groups the midmarket/enterprise segment together for its sales teams. Customers in that segment range from 500 seats up to the Fortune 100 with hundreds of thousands of seats. The midmarket/enterprise D&H partners, typically with more than $10 million in sales, sell advanced solutions including cloud services, security, networking, server and storage.

TD Synnex said it does not comment on the financial performance of competitors.

Ingram Micro said it is in a quiet period and declined to comment.

In North America, where D&H competes head-to-head with TD Synnex and Ingram Micro, Ingram Micro’s North America sales declined 4.5 percent to $17.37 billion in Fiscal Year 2024, ended Dec. 28, compared with $18.19 billion in Fiscal Year 2023.

TD Synnex’s Americas sales, meanwhile, increased 0.6 percent in Fiscal Year 2024, ended Nov. 30, to $34.79 billion compared with $34.57 billion in Fiscal Year 2023.

Schwab said the midmarket/enterprise market momentum has come as competitors are pushing partners toward self-service models “leveraging AI and platform automation” to reduce ‘human involvement” in the sales process.

D&H, for its part, has maintained its razor-sharp focus on driving deep-seated personal relationships with partners through D&H account reps and the D&H leadership team, said Schwab.

“While we are doubling down on service, a lot of other companies are going the other way,” he said. “They are outsourcing roles. They are pushing people to self-service, driving answers only via AI instead of being able to talk to one of our employee co-owners that have an average tenure of over 10 years. D&H believes that trust, relationships and expertise remain at the core of IT distribution. Channel partnerships are still a people-to-people business, and D&H wants to continue to reinforce our customer-centric business model.”

The D&H midmarket/enterprise momentum has grown considerably since the company hired distribution superstar Marty Bauerlein four years ago as chief consumer and commercial officer.

Bauerlein, a highly respected 13-year TD Synnex veteran and a 10-year Ingram Micro veteran, has helped lead D&H’s charge into the midmarket/enterprise market.

Bauerlein: A Linchpin To D&H’s Midmarket/Enterprise Success

“Hiring Marty was a linchpin to our success because he has assembled a team of current D&H co-owners and new recruits to D&H,” said Schwab. “We have hired over 100 people from different distributors in the last 18 months. What it has really done is it has validated D&H as a midmarket/enterprise destination. Those individuals have relationships and are able to articulate our midmarket/enterprise value proposition.”

As far as customer-facing sales reps and engineers, D&H has hired 250 new staff members over the last three years, said Schwab. In addition, he said, the company currently has 109 open positions it is adding to its payroll.

D&H over the last three years has invested more than $18 million annually into its payroll to bring in “exceptional and tenured industry talent that enhance our deeply tenured, co-owner team,” said Schwab.

“As our Chief Commercial Officer Marty Bauerlein puts it, our goal is to put the best team on the field,” Schwab said. “I personally believe D&H’s executive team sets the industry standard, confidently based on talent, assuredly based on character.”

Among the executives who have joined D&H to help power the midmarket/enterprise offensive are Colin Blair, a five-year TD Synnex veteran and 19-year Avnet veteran, who joined D&H in June as vice president of cybersecurity and emerging technologies; Dan Lasher, a 32-year TD Synnex veteran, who joined D&H in June 2024 as CIO and CISO; Brian Zukoski, a 20-year TD Synnex veteran, who joined D&H in September 2023 as CFO; and Anthony Graziano, a 17-year TD Synnex veteran, who joined D&H in June 2023 as senior vice president of marketing.

Solution providers, for their part, have credited D&H Vice President of U.S. Commercial Field Sales Neil Stafford, a former six-year TD Synnex veteran and 17-year Ingram Micro veteran; D&H Vice President of Sales Rob Webster, a former 17-year TD Synnex veteran; and D&H Vice President of U.S. Commercial and Consumer Sales Jeff English, a former 28-year TD Synnex veteran, for providing the midmarket sales muscle to drive the share gains.

Also key to the midmarket/enterprise renaissance at D&H has been top talent from midmarket-focused solution providers and vendors including David Soscia, vice president of Cisco Product Management and Business Development, a Cisco specialist who joined D&H two years ago from solution provider powerhouse NWN; and Megan Zeigler, a former VMware and Hewlett Packard Enterprise veteran, who joined D&H earlier this year as the senior director of modern infrastructure.

Precision Computer Services, a Shelton, Conn.-based MSP, moved all of its Cisco business to D&H in January after becoming dissatisfied with the service from a larger distributor after a number of employees left the company, jeopardizing a more than decade-long relationship, said Jeff Clark, executive vice president at Precision. “Slowly as people started leaving, we lost visibility, we lost relationships, we lost escalation points,” he said. “We didn’t know who to reach out to. A lot of those people ended up at D&H.”

At D&H, Clark said, he has found a highly committed team of customer-focused employees and executives who have gone above and beyond to help Precision be successful. “D&H is client-experience-focused. They want to make sure we are happy, and they are willing to do things other distributors aren’t willing to do,” he said.

One example is D&H’s willingness to provide custom Cisco shipping reports for Precision customers, said Clark. “D&H did those reports specifically for us,” he said. “They customized their support for us. That is what I love about them.”

The Cisco custom shipping reports, in fact, saved the Precision inside sales team about 10 hours a week, time that is now being put back into driving business value for customers. “D&H wants to add value,” said Clark.

The Employee-Owned Company Difference

D&H’s status as an employee-owned company with an employee stock ownership plan sets the company apart from other distributors, said Clark. “The D&H employees are all aligned,” he said. “They really want to solve your problems versus saying, ‘That is not my job.’ Everybody understands the mission.”

Clark said among the standout executives at D&H making a difference for Precision are Stafford and Soscia.

“[Stafford] is amazing; he treats his customers the way I treat my customers,” said Clark. “I know them all and find time to hang out with them. Neil picks up the phone when I have a problem and makes the problem go away.”

As for Soscia, Clark said he has resolved a number of Cisco issues for Precision. “Cisco thought one of our certifications lapsed, and D&H got it cleared up,” he said. “Dave Soscia took care of that. From a Cisco perspective, he is D&H’s silver bullet. He is incredible.”

Clark said D&H is having a “very strong impact” on Precision’s profitability. “We are going to be able to do more with less through how easy they are to work with and how responsive they are,” he said. “I fully expect us to have a long, very profitable and mutually beneficial relationship.”

The Secret Sauce Is ‘Partner Experience’

Mike Jordan, chief business officer for NEXTmsp, a fast-growing next-generation MSSP that also offers security and other managed services to other MSPs, said his spending with D&H will increase 10X this year as the company—which previously worked with larger distributors—does more and more business with D&H.

“The D&H secret sauce is the partner experience,” he said. “It is just like watching high-definition television. You have to experience it. For you to really appreciate the synergy with D&H, you have to experience the carnage the bigger distributors put in front of you. It’s all about timely quotes and engagement, deal registration and project verification, presales support and post-sales support.”

Jordan estimates his company’s profit margins have increased by eight to 10 points because of the speed and efficiency D&H provides in distribution essentials like procurement, shipping and delivery to customers. “I don’t have to pay somebody to sit there and manage the deal,” he said. “In essence, they maintain my margin and protect me on the logistics side. Time is money.”

The level of service D&H provides is “unique” in the distribution business with service levels far above larger players, said Jordan. “At the end of the day, D&H just gets it,” he said. “They are synergistic with their partners. They understand the inside sales rep role and they take on the role representing the manufacturer. I can reach out anytime to get a vendor specialist at D&H via phone, email or a chat app. At the end of the day, the biggest takeaway is D&H values my business.”

That is in sharp contrast to communicating with larger distributors that refer partners to toll-free numbers or require his company to open up a ticket, said Jordan. “D&H listens,” he said. “I think D&H has been doing a lot of listening. I know what Rob Webster looks like. I know what Anthony [Graziano] looks like. They don’t hide behind a desk.”

The big shift to D&H comes as NEXTmsp has consolidated the number of vendors it represents and moved 80 percent of its procurement from other distributors to D&H as the company’s primary distributor over the last two months.

One example of D&H’s ability to go above and beyond for NEXTmsp is the way it handled the company’s rebranding from The Brookfield Group to NEXTmsp, said Jordan. “When we went through this rebranding and started the new company as NEXTmsp, we didn’t miss a beat with D&H,” he said. “We could have been looked at as just another startup.”

Jordan, who has worked with D&H for several decades at his prior company, Target Distributing, said he was able to quickly handle the rebranding with a phone call to Webster.

“We had orders for The Brookfield Group that were taken care of,” he said. “[Webster] and his team engaged with us, gave us a line of credit for the new company, allowed us to fulfill our orders and set up a whole new account with invoices rocking and rolling for the new company.” That kind of quick turnaround just would not have been possible at one of the larger distributors, insisted Jordan.

Jordan also praised the high level of service provided by D&H Strategic Account Rep Anthony Defelice, who joined D&H in 2023 after working for four years as a sales rep at TD Synnex. In fact, Jordan said, he trusts Defelice and Webster to help his company make the right solutions buying decisions. “I put my customer information in the subject line of my emails to D&H because I trust them,” he said.

Jordan said he sees D&H’s SMB heritage and high service levels leading to an increasing amount of enterprise and midmarket business for the distributor. “If D&H keeps their ear to the ground like they have been and they keep engaging with partners like they are, then the sky is the limit for them,” he said.

Steve Van Ginkel, senior vice president of partner alliances and services at Sterling, the $1 billion-plus solution provider behemoth, No. 54 on the 2025 CRN Solution Provider 500, said his company’s business with D&H has grown substantially over the last several years as a result of D&H’s “best-of-breed” focus on execution.

“Five years ago, they represented a very small portion of our spend,” he said. “That has grown substantially. In the last few years, they have added significant brands and made significant investments in supporting those OEMs. They have been doing a really good job on Cisco, HPE and HP. Speed and accuracy is the No. 1 reason we are growing our business with D&H. That has had a big impact on our growth with D&H.”

Van Ginkel also praised the “personal” touch provided by brothers and Co-Presidents Dan and Michael Schwab as well as Bauerlein. “Their understanding of our business has made a big difference,” he said.

Van Ginkel said he sees a bright future ahead with D&H. “If they stay on the same trajectory with the same level of service, we’ll continue to grow significantly with them in the future,” he said.

Dan Schwab, for his part, said D&H is not standing still and in fact is upping its midmarket/enterprise game with a multimillion-dollar investment in interactive and immersive training destinations focused on helping partners grow their business. The training and solutions destinations, which will launch in October, are for AI, Cyber-Resilience and a Pro AV (Audio Visual) Zone.

“This is what we are doing to leapfrog our competitors,” he said. “The world is getting more complicated. We believe it is our job to help not only create training for partners but, more than that, to create interactive and immersive solutions where they can demo solutions.”

Schwab said he has never felt “more optimistic” about D&H’s future.

“I think we are positioned really well to help partners grow their business and increase their profitability,” he said. “That is our formula: how do we help partners grow their business and increase their profitability in a quickly evolving and changing business environment.”