Graybar: Deftly connecting procurement systems, processes, and customers for optimal business-to-business exchanges
Explore how Graybar stays connected to customers
When electrical components distributor Graybar decided to simplify how its customers transact with it, the company opted for SAP Business Network for Suppliers. By integrating with customers and streamlining data exchange and synchronization, Graybar can view orders, respond to queries, and check payments in one online space.
| Industry | Region | Company Size |
| Wholesale distribution | North America (headquarters: St. Louis, Missouri) | >9,500 employees |
customer relationships established on SAP Business Network.
success rate using the SAP Business Network Discovery solution.
faster to complete customer integrations.
Director of Business Performance, Graybar
Streamlining business transactions with customers
Graybar, a Fortune 500 company, is a leading distributor of electrical, communications, data networking, and industrial products and is one of the largest employee-owned companies in North America. Graybar serves customers engaged in new construction projects, infrastructure updates, building renovation, facility maintenance, repair and operations, and original equipment manufacturing. It also specializes in related supply chain management and logistics services.
Operating a network of more than 345 distribution facilities across the United States and Canada, Graybar stocks and sells products from thousands of manufacturers, adding value for customers and suppliers with innovative solutions and services. The company provides a vital link in the supply chain, helping its more than 150,000 customers power, connect, automate, and secure their facilities with speed, intelligence, and efficiency.
As a distributor with a large customer base, Graybar sought the best-fit solution to digitalize its operations to streamline and automate transacting with its customers.
Efficiently integrating buyer and supplier systems
Wanting to simplify how customers do business with it, Graybar chose a modern way to collaborate and transact with them by moving to SAP Business Network for Suppliers. This allowed the company to connect with its customers’ business and trading systems to facilitate data exchange and synchronization.
John Tintera, director of business performance at Graybar, comments, “Our integrations through SAP Business Network for Suppliers allow us to transact in multiple document types, which allows our customers to view and retain data from Graybar. This helps them in their efficiency of doing business and helps us ensure that we can process transactions more quickly than on nondigital channels.”
Through SAP Business Network for Suppliers, Graybar digitalized processes for customer orders, order changes, order confirmations, advanced ship notices, and invoices. The company can also respond electronically to requests for quotes and proposals through SAP Business Network, as well as provide catalog solutions with connected trading partners.
Tintera adds, “By providing a variety of ways to connect and support both the customer and supplier sides of the channel, SAP Business Network helps nurture growth. It allows Graybar to continue to demonstrate a customer focus and commitment to efficiency that benefits our employees.”
Director of Business Performance, Graybar
Championing exceptional customer service through integrations
Transacting with 388 customers through SAP Business Network for Suppliers has helped Graybar nurture solid growth by demonstrating a strong customer focus and commitment to doing business efficiently, benefiting customers and employees.
Since the company started using SAP Business Network for Suppliers, the average time it takes to complete a customer integration has decreased from around 65 days to just 24 days.
Tintera comments on this outcome. “For the past five years, we’ve decreased our average customer integration completion duration by about 10% every year. That’s because we’ve been able to tailor the process and proactively resolve issues early in testing with customers. Having the supplier enablement service from SAP also helped us expedite customer or setup issues. Now, 99% of orders flow freely into our system through SAP Business Network without human intervention.”
Elsewhere, by taking advantage of the SAP Business Network Discovery solution, Graybar has been exposed to new customers, enabling it to make bids for jobs that it otherwise may not have found. Tintera says, “As of this year, we supported business growth using SAP Business Network Discovery, submitting 68 bids and winning 66 of those proposals from new customers in this community.”
Looking to the future, Graybar plans to continue to take advantage of SAP Business Network for Suppliers and a variety of robust transaction and integration options.
Director of Business Performance, Graybar