Why This Matters to Distributors: Artificial intelligence is moving from experimentation to execution across wholesale distribution. As leading companies deploy AI across sales, operations, customer service and supply chain functions, distributors still evaluating pilot projects risk falling behind. Distribution Strategy Group’s AI Forum Atlanta will focus on the strategies, technologies and leadership practices helping distributors scale AI into measurable business results.
Artificial intelligence is no longer a future strategy for wholesale distributors. Increasingly, it is becoming an operational advantage.
The challenge has shifted from deciding whether to invest in AI to determining how to deploy it across the enterprise in ways that improve productivity, strengthen customer relationships, and drive profitable growth.
That transition will take center stage Aug. 12 when Distribution Strategy Group hosts its inaugural AI Forum Atlanta at the Georgia Tech Conference Center. The one-day event will bring together more than 50 distribution executives, technology leaders, and AI practitioners for a day of practical discussions on how distributors are moving AI beyond pilot projects and into everyday operations.
The conference opens with a fireside keynote featuring Praveen Gautam, chief information officer of BlueLinx, who will discuss how the building products distributor is building an AI-ready organization. Gautam will share lessons from BlueLinx’s AI transformation, including the technology, data and organizational changes required to integrate AI across a large distribution business.
The keynote is followed by one of the day’s featured sessions: a distributor leadership panel examining how companies are putting AI to work at scale.
Moderated by Ian Heller, co-founder and chief strategy officer of Distribution Strategy Group, the panel brings together Praveen Gautam of BlueLinx, Abhi Singh, president and CEO of ProContractor Supply, and Sean McCloskey, senior vice president at Wesco. The executives will discuss where AI delivers measurable business value today, how their organizations identified high-impact use cases, the challenges of moving beyond pilot projects and the governance needed to support enterprise-wide deployment.
The DSG regional event will provide attendees with practical insight from distributors that are actively integrating AI into sales, operations, and customer service rather than simply evaluating the technology.
The program also features presentations from industry leaders focused on implementation rather than theory.
Jonathan Bein, DSG co-founder and managing partner, will open the conference with an overview of AI adoption across wholesale distribution and new research into what separates distributors successfully scaling AI from those still in the pilot stage.
Jack Carrere, CEO and co-founder of Prokeep, will examine how AI is changing customer communication and sales engagement. Ben Dwyer, head of forward deployed engineering at Proton.ai, will discuss how distributors can build enterprise AI architecture that supports daily operations rather than isolated applications. Jeff Metersky, a veteran supply chain technology executive, will explore how agentic AI is reshaping planning, forecasting, and operational decision-making. Later in the day, Brian Hopkins, DSG’s chief operating officer, will demonstrate how distributors are moving beyond chatbots by building AI workspaces that improve productivity across sales, customer service, and operations.
Unlike broader technology conferences, AI Forum Atlanta is designed exclusively for wholesale distribution. Every attendee participates in the same program, encouraging discussion among peers throughout the day. Technology sessions have also been structured around distributor use cases rather than product demonstrations, with an emphasis on practical implementation strategies.
The event comes as AI adoption reaches an inflection point across the industry.
DSG’s recent AI Execution Gap research found that while 93% of distribution executives consider AI a strategic priority, only 16% have deployed AI across multiple business functions. The findings suggest the competitive advantage is shifting to distributors that have embedded AI into core business processes, including pricing, inventory management, sales, customer service, and supply chain operations.
Those companies are beginning to benefit from a compounding effect. Better forecasting improves inventory decisions. Stronger inventory data enhances customer service. Every customer interaction creates additional information that improves future AI recommendations. As those capabilities expand across the enterprise, the gap between AI leaders and companies still experimenting with isolated pilot projects continues to widen.
Atlanta marks the first stop in DSG’s expanding regional AI event strategy following the success of its Applied AI for Distributors conference in Chicago. The series will continue this fall with an AI Forum serving distributors across the United Kingdom and Europe, reflecting growing demand for practical guidance on implementing AI in wholesale distribution.
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