DISTRIBUTION

Process Automation for Mid-Market Distributors

  • Eliminate manual data entry and reduce costly errors
  • Speed up order fulfillment and improve accuracy
  • Reduce operating costs and protect margins
  • Improve cash flow through faster billing and collections
  • Respond quickly to supply chain disruptions
  • Maintain regulatory compliance effortlessly
  • Offer Amazon-like customer experience at mid-market scale
  • Modernize legacy systems without full replacement
  • Scale operations without scaling headcount
Distribution Process Automation detail 2

The Automation Opportunity for Mid-Market Distributors

Mid-market wholesale distributors are caught in a perfect storm of operational inefficiency, labor shortages, compliance pressure, and fierce competition. Key challenges include: 

  • Cumbersome manual processes 
  • Persistent labor shortages 
  • Mounting regulatory pressure 
  • Elevated customer expectations 
  • Fragmented legacy systems

 

Fortunately, AI-powered process automation offers a practical path forward by empowering distributors to digitize and streamline nearly every part of the distribution value chain. Whether it’s automating order entry, reconciling invoices, or managing returns, automation delivers speed, accuracy, and savings. It also frees up staff to focus on value-added work, boosts customer satisfaction, and helps distributors operate with the agility of much larger firms.

With the right partner and a targeted approach, distributors can quickly turn process pain points into performance gains, without a costly overhaul of existing systems.

Top 10-1

Top 10 Automation Use Cases for Mid-Market Distributors

Following are ten of the most impactful process automation use cases for mid-market wholesale distributors. 

  1. Sales Order Processing – Automatically capture and enter customer orders across email, EDI, and web channels to speed up fulfillment and reduce entry errors. 
  2. Inventory Management – Monitor stock levels in real time and trigger replenishment using predictive analytics to prevent stockouts and excess inventory. 
  3. Accounts Payable – Extract, validate, and process thousands of vendor invoices automatically to reduce manual effort and ensure timely payment. 
  4. Accounts Receivable – Generate and send invoices automatically and match incoming payments to the correct accounts to accelerate cash flow. 
  5. Customer Service – Use bots to handle routine inquiries and status updates 24/7, improving responsiveness without increasing headcount. 
  6. Shipping and Logistics – Automate carrier booking, label generation, and tracking updates to streamline shipping and reduce delivery errors. 
  7. Returns Processing – Manage the end-to-end returns process—including RMAs, credits, and inventory updates—quickly and accurately with automation. 
  8. Pricing and Product Updates – Synchronize price changes and product data across ERP, CRM, and e-commerce platforms instantly and without errors. 
  9. Compliance Reporting – Automatically gather and submit required data for tax filings, audits, and partner requirements, reducing risk and manual effort. 
  10. Customer & Supplier Onboarding – Automate credit checks, record creation, and documentation workflows to bring new partners online faster and more reliably. 
  11.  

How R-Path Is Helping Mid-Market Distributors Seize Their Automation Opportunity

When you partner with R-Path you get a fully-managed, turnkey automation program that systematically identifies, prioritizes, and executes on high-impact automation opportunities within your institution. It’s the fastest, easiest, and most affordable way to harness your company’s automation opportunity and it’s offered on a simple subscription basis with no term commitment. 

Key Features of R-Path’s Fully-Managed Automation Program include:

  • AUTOMATION PLANNING

    AUTOMATION PLANNING

    Prior to engaging, and at no cost to you, R-Path will lead you through an Automation Opportunity Assessment that defines the size and nature of your automation opportunity. Based on this assessment, we establish your automation plan and project roadmap.

  • IMPLEMENTATION

    TECHNOLOGY IMPLEMENTATION

    During the Automation Planning process, we'll help you select the automation platform that best aligns with your company's automation strategy and budget. Once engaged, we'll manage the process of procuring and implementing your tech.

  • PROGRAM MANAGMENT ALT

    PROGRAM MANAGEMENT

    Your R-Path automation team is led by a Sr. Program Manager focused exclusively on delivering the results you desire. They will identify & prioritize automation opportunities, roadmap & manage projects, define standards, manage personnel, and communicate with stakeholders.

  • DEVELOPMENT

    AUTOMATION DEVELOPMENT

    Once you've approved an automation project for development, your R-Path Team swings into action. We begin by clarifying, optimizing, and documenting the process. We then design, develop, and test. With your approval, we deploy the automations.

  • MAINTENANCE

    AUTOMATION MAINTENANCE

    Before deploying automation, we develop a comprehensive plan for monitoring and maintaining performance over time. Once deployed, we use a proprietary system called Siren to proactively monitor its performance. If we detect an issue, we spring into action to prevent or minimize downtime.

Speak with an R-Path expert to explore your automation opportunity. 

Featured Case Study

Putting R-Path to Work for Your Business 

If you’re interested in partnering with R-Path to implement a fully managed automation program, here’s how it works: 

8-2
  1. Opportunity Assessment (no cost) – Identify 10–20 candidate automations, estimate financial impact, recommend platform. 
  2. Proof of Concept (no cost) – We build a live automation to prove feasibility and business value. 
  3. Subscription KickOff – Finalize  terms, onboard your RPath team, and activate licenses. 
  4. Build & Deploy – New automations roll into production while prior ones accrue measurable savings. 
  5. Maintain & Optimize – When ROIpositive pipeline is exhausted, we transition to a lowcost “MaintenanceOnly” mode—typically ~90% cost reduction. 
 
Schedule a call to see if your organization qualifies for a  free Automation Opportunity Assessment. 
 
  

Why Mid-Market Distributors Choose R-Path

  • Speed to Value – Employing an exceptionally experienced and cohesive US-based team, R-Path delivers real business value in a fraction of the time required by competing solutions. 
  • Exceptional Quality – Enterprise‑grade standards, rigorous QA, and veteran developers turn every automation into mission‑ready infrastructure you can trust. 
  • Partner Experience – Guided by our mantra “Be a good partner,” we’re responsive, generous, and candid—no black‑box consulting here. 
  • Unmatched Value – When you add up faster ROI, lower license spend, and maintenance down‑shift, no alternative delivers more automation per dollar.

 

Distribution Process Automation detail 3