The Week at the Table: October 26–30, 2026

This week’s stories each start inside the company: a distributor that rebuilt its sales literature when its own people stopped using it, a CEO who put AI on the quote after watching how his branches built one, and a brand that reached its employees and dealers before its riders. The fourth looks at the buyer on the other side: Forrester expects buyers to check what their AI agents tell them, with people.

Atlantic Coast Electric Supply replaced its product brochures with bimonthly guides built around contractor problems.

In 2025 the distributor found that customer engagement with its brochures and its own employees’ use of them were both declining. tED Magazine lists the themed Solution Guides that replaced them among this year’s Best of the Best winners for selling tools. Source: tED Magazine.

Fastenal says AI can cut quoting at some branches from five or six days to about 15 minutes.

CEO Jeff Watts gave it as an example of branch efficiency, not a company average. He said the effort began after branch visits showed quoting practices resembling those he used 30 years earlier. Source: Distribution Strategy Group.

Harley-Davidson took its new brand to employees first, then dealers, then riders.

The new global platform rests on one word, Ride, and chief brand officer Marcus Fischer described the change as a move “from intimidation to invitation.” The article reports no business results yet. Source: Chief Marketer.

Two-thirds of B2B providers will lose deals because buyers cannot verify their claims, Forrester predicts.

Forrester’s 2027 predictions say buyers will use AI agents from finding suppliers to analyzing contract renewals, then double their human contacts to check what the agents recommend. These are forecasts, not survey results. Source: Forrester.

One article a day, every day, on LinkedIn and at themarketingtable.com. Follow The Marketing Table on LinkedIn, and forward this to someone who runs an industrial business.

Each story links to our note on it, and each note links to the original article and credits its publisher and author. The Marketing Table shares the link and a note on why it matters; the articles and their copyright belong to the publishers.