On August 22, Carolina Wholesale Group (CWG) announced that it acquired Digitek Computer Products, making it one of the largest distributors of imaging supplies and business machines in the United States. “We’ve been a distributor for close to 45 years, and we’ve witnessed a significant softening of print market and strengthening of omni-channel in the past decade,” said CWG President Larry Huneycutt. “We made the decision within the past 18 months that we needed to diversify through acquisition, and that lead to discussions with Digitek.”
“Digitek is excited to be joining forces with the CWG team,” said Digitek founder Paul Martorana.” By combining the resources and talents of these two strong organizations, we will be well positioned to provide our customers with the broadest product offering, the most cutting edge industry sales and marketing tools, as well as the most expansive distribution footprint in the industry.”
The deal significantly expands the product portfolio available to CWG customers, adding 5,000 unique items. It also speeds delivery through 11 distribution centers. “Digitek will continue to operate independently with its own management and current infrastructure in place,” said Huneycutt. “CWG will share products, vendor relationships, and programs with Digitek just as Digitek will in return to the other CWG distributors.”
This is the latest in a long series of CWG acquisitions, which include Arlington Industries, Smoltz Distributing, and Monroe Systems for Business. “We had tremendous success following the acquisition of Arlington Industries over a decade ago, and a large contributor to our prosperity through Arlington has been allowing them to operate independently,” said Huneycutt.
CWG customers will also have access to Digitek’s PartnerPro online sales training modules and dealer branded marketing tools. “Digitek’s Partner Pro program will begin to provide additional value-add to all of CWG’s individual entities and their customers,” said Huneycutt. “Digitek has had a strong presence in the government and VAR vertical markets in which CWG has not seen as much success.”
Huneycutt said that Digitek and all other CWG distributors will have access to inventory from all network distribution centers in the coming week. “Arlington and CWG have long desired a distribution center in Texas. This acquisition provides a more comprehensive selection of shipping points across the United States for all our dealers with the addition of our new Dallas area facility.” Digitek’s Partner Pro solution will be available to Arlington, Carolina Wholesale, and Smoltz Distributing dealers in the next month. The company will also begin sharing vendor programs, private-label solutions, and internal marketing resources.
“We have strong relationships with vendors such as Canon, Kyocera, Samsung, Ricoh, and Xerox that will now be shared across the Carolina Wholesale Group of companies, providing more product alternatives and an expanded distribution network to each of our customers,” said Huneycutt.”In the end, we will be the one-stop shop distributor for products, services, and solutions regardless of the CWG distributor with which you choose to partner.”
