10 Best Wholesale Distribution Software

On paper, wholesale distribution seems to be a very simple process. Move products from supplier to retailer, get paid. But in reality, it’s a highly complex ecosystem where efficiency makes all the difference between profit and loss. From juggling large order volumes to managing fluctuating stock levels and ensuring timely fulfillment, even the most experienced wholesalers face unique hurdles that can drain margins and damage buyer trust. 

This is where wholesale distribution software steps in as a strategic enabler, unifying operations and offering real-time visibility across the supply chain. In this blog, we’ll explore the 10 best wholesale distribution software platforms that forward-thinking businesses are adopting today to stay agile and resilient.

What is a wholesale distribution software?

Wholesale distribution software is an application that packages core wholesale operations like inventory management, order processing, warehouse operations, logistics, and customer engagement into one unified system for improved efficiency and visibility. It serves as the nerve center for the modern wholesale distribution process. 

To put this into perspective:

• Without wholesale distribution software:  The wholesaler uses spreadsheets for stock counts, uses phone calls to confirm deliveries, and relies on gut instinct for reordering. 
• With wholesale distribution software: Inventory levels automatically sync across warehouses, orders flow seamlessly from sales reps’ mobile devices, and delivery updates provide buyers with real-time visibility on orders.

Why do you need a wholesale distribution software?

Wholesale distribution software provides a wide array of benefits to the wholesaler using it. Here are the key ones: 

• Low operation costs: By automating manual tasks across various wholesale functions, this software cuts down on wasted resources and labor. This helps in lowering your daily operation costs. 
• Simplified sales processes: Your reps can create and manage orders on the go (like tradeshows) through the same software present as an application on their smartphones. Integrated systems ensure that orders and payment flows are accurately recorded so that there is no mismatch. 
• Optimized inventory management: The system tracks stock levels in real time and triggers smart reordering. This prevents stockouts, overstocking, and missed sales opportunities.
• Improved buyer experience: Wholesale distribution software often provides easy digital catalog access, allowing buyers to browse products and place orders without back-and-forth communication. This self-service convenience simplifies purchasing and builds stronger customer loyalty.

For additional reading: What is Wholesale Distribution and How Does It Work?

What are the key features to look for in a wholesale distribution software?

Choosing wholesale distribution software isn’t just about ticking boxes. You need to see if it fits your precise needs and offers all the necessary capabilities to run your operations effortlessly. Here are some of the key capabilities your software should offer if you want to move beyond basic efficiency in wholesale distribution:

• Real-time inventory intelligence: The software should offer live stock tracking across all warehouses. This ensures you always know what’s available. It should also provide automated alerts to prevent both stockouts and overstocking.
• Dedicated mobile app for reps: The software should offer a mobile app that allows reps to access product catalogs and place orders on the spot (like in tradeshows). It should also let them capture customer information and send an order confirmation email while in the field.
• AI-powered sales assistance: The software should offer AI-driven recommendations for cross-selling and upselling opportunities. It should also offer valuable buyer insights to improve conversions.
• Buyer approval flow: The software should provide a built-in approval process for onboarding buyers or accounts. This ensures only verified organizations gain access to view the catalog and place orders. It should also offer automated notifications to streamline the approval cycle, speed up decisions, and prevent delays.
• Lead management and enrichment: The software should offer tools to capture and score leads effectively. It should also enrich them with additional data, helping sales teams prioritize the most valuable opportunities.
• Analytics and reports: The software should offer comprehensive dashboards and custom reports for tracking performance. It should also provide actionable insights into sales trends and customer behavior.

Top wholesale distribution software you should consider

Here is our pick of the best wholesale distribution apps that you can consider adopting in your organization: 

1. WizCommerce: Best AI-powered software suitable for all types of businesses

If there is one tool that checks all the key capabilities of a highly robust and functional wholesale distribution software, it is WizCommerce, and that’s why we have placed it at the top of this list. WizCommerce is an AI-powered wholesale distribution software built to simplify modern B2B selling. Unlike traditional platforms, it has been designed from the ground up with the complex needs of wholesalers and distributors in mind, using the power of artificial intelligence.

And that’s why you will find a wide range of features that focus on automating end-to-end wholesale workflows, right from order capture and offline support to pricing and checkout. With deep industry expertise and a strong focus on scalability, WizCommerce goes beyond just digitizing your wholesale distribution operations and delivers real-time visibility of inventory, orders, and customer activity, which helps in shaping tailored buying experiences for improved conversions. 

Key features

• Seamless integrations:  WizCommerce offers plug-and-play connectivity with ERPs, accounting systems, inventory tools, and e-commerce platforms for quick deployment. This ensures you can centralize operations and avoid data silos, all the while maintaining real-time accuracy across your supply chain.
• Customizable checkouts: You can build flexible checkout flows with tailored payment terms, billing, and shipping options aligned with B2B buying behaviors. This helps you accommodate diverse buyer needs and streamline complex bulk ordering processes.
• Multiple price lists: This feature lets you instantly create and toggle between customized price lists to support diverse buyer personas and deal scenarios. This, in turn, allows you to cater to retailers of different buying power, boosting conversion rates.
• Offline order management: Your reps can capture and process orders at trade shows or low-connectivity zones, with auto-sync once online. This ensures sales continuity in wholesale environments where on-the-ground order-taking is critical.
• AI-powered sales assistant (Kai): It is an in-house AI assistant that provides real-time customer insights and actionable prompts to help reps close deals faster. This enables your reps to engage buyers with the right products and offers, improving deal velocity.
• Analytics & reporting: Intuitive dashboards with lead scoring, sales performance tracking, and buyer behavior insights for data-driven decisions. You also get an intuitive dashboard with lead scoring, sales performance tracking, and buyer behavior insights for data-driven decisions. This allows your reps to identify high-value buyers and optimize sales strategies for growth. 

2. SAP: Best for analytics

SAP’s wholesale distribution software is a highly industry-specific solution designed to help wholesale distributors automate their end-to-end workflows related to inventory management, order processing, pricing, procurement, and customer relationship management. By digitizing these processes end-to-end, the platform allows wholesale businesses to deliver better service to their buyers and control costs. With built-in analytics, SAP helps wholesalers optimize stock levels and manage buyer relationships by responding faster to market demands. 

Key features

• Unified order management: You can manage orders across all sales channels through a single, configurable system. This ensures a consistent customer experience.
• Pricing and revenue optimization: You can use the platform’s data-driven insights to adjust pricing based on demand, elasticity, and business rules. This helps maximize margins and competitiveness.
• Customer data and identity management: You can maintain secure, unified customer profiles to manage identity, consent, and authentication. This enables personalized and trusted interactions.
• Supply chain visibility: You can gain near real-time insights into procurement and warehouse operations. Also, with the integrated logistics module, you can have better operational and delivery control.

For additional reading: How to effectively use B2B wholesale software for inventory management?

3. NetSuite: Best for warehouse management

NetSuite’s wholesale distribution solution is designed to help businesses better manage their inventory and fulfillment processes. It enables centralized control of stock across multiple locations and sales channels. Through its demand-based planning capability, it helps balance inventory levels by factoring in forecasts and historical trends. With integrated fulfillment tools, you can also streamline picking, packing, and shipping to reduce costs and improve delivery timelines. This ultimately helps with maintaining customer satisfaction.

Key features

• Orders management: You can accept and manage orders across all channels, including online, offline, and EDI, within the platform. This helps in accelerating the order-to-cash cycle as orders are channel-agnostic.
• Sourcing: This capability gives you full control over procure-to-pay processes to strengthen supplier relationships and improve transparency in the procurement process.
• Warehouse management:  You can use the built-in Warehouse Management System to cut overhead and boost inventory turnover. This also ensures you have higher on-time delivery rates.
• Buyer management: The platform provides your sales, support, and service teams with real-time access to customer data. This includes preferences and interactions so that consistent service across all touchpoints is ensured.

4. QuickBooks Enterprise: Best for blending distribution with accounting

QuickBooks Enterprise for Wholesale & Distribution is a software suite aimed at helping wholesalers manage everything from inventory and sales order fulfillment to purchasing and accounting in one system. It supports multiple warehouses, cloud access, vendor-management workflows, and inventory tracking across locations. The tool also offers tailored industry reports and customized functionalities for businesses with more complex needs, such as multiple sites or fulfillment demands.

Key features

• Barcode scanning: You can use the platform’s mobile barcode scanning function for picking, receiving, and cycle counts. You can also track inventory by bin or pallet across warehouses and trucks with detailed reports.
• Vendor management: This feature helps you manage all vendor information in one place, including outstanding purchase orders. You can also compare contracts, pricing, and batch-import vendor price lists for efficiency.
• Pricing management: This module helps you calculate landed costs with shipping, duties, and taxes included. You can even apply automated and category-specific pricing rules to protect margins and cut manual work.
• Inventory tracking: QuickBooks lets you track goods across warehouses, trucks, consignment, and staging areas. You can also use its multi-level location tracking feature and lot-based expiration dates to speed up fulfillment.

5. Infor: Best for multi-location support

Infor is a cloud-based ERP(Enterprise Resource Planning) solution that also serves as a distribution management software. The platform provides workflows and role-based interfaces that align with the typical operational needs for wholesalers and distributors. Infor supports most of the critical wholesale distribution components, including inventory, warehouse, and supply chain management. It also offers pre-configured processes and AI-assisted automation to improve efficiency in day-to-day tasks.

Key features

• Multi-location support: With Infor, you can manage multiple sites or warehouses efficiently. This gives you the necessary operational oversight and centralized control across locations.
• Embedded analytics: The platform offers actionable insights through a built-in analytics module. You can use the generated insights to make strategic decisions and improve overall business performance.
• Seamless integration: Infor wholesale distribution software connects quickly with other Infor applications. This creates a cohesive and streamlined operational environment.
• Embedded PIM: The platform offers a central hub for managing and enriching product data. You can attach images, PDFs, videos, and other media while offering a flexible modeling environment to distribute your products.

6. Candid: Best for integrated communication

Candid is a wholesale platform designed to connect buyers, sellers, suppliers, payments, and orders within a single system. It enables collaboration with sellers through storefronts, catalogs, and line sheets. An integrated CRM helps maintain clear relationships across brands, and a tiered permission system ensures that the right people have access to the right information without oversharing sensitive sales or contact data. Additionally, the platform provides real-time commission reporting and click tracking, giving businesses greater visibility into performance and sales activity.

Key features

• Payments management: You can track incoming and outgoing payments, monitor shipments and invoices in real time, and send reminders for overdue invoices to keep cash flow steady.
• Integrated payments: The platform supports multiple payment methods, including ACH, credit cards, and cash, and also credit cards via Stripe.
• Integrated messaging: You can manage all communications within Candid, from sending past-due reminders to email notifications. It ensures timely updates for customers.
• Reporting & analytics: You can generate detailed sales reports by order, customer, or product, and use selling signals to track visits to your Storefront and Catalog.

For additional reading: How to Find Wholesale Suppliers for Your Business?

7. B2B Wave: Best for quote management

B2B Wave is not a conventional wholesale distribution software. It is rather a suite of different tools that help in managing the wholesale selling process. For instance, there is a dedicated sales rep app that allows sales representatives to manage and place orders on behalf of buyers with permissions configured to match the accounts they’re assigned to. Then there is a B2B ordering portal where buyers can place new orders, view their order history, and reorder. Tools like these form the core of this platform. 

Key features

• In-app communication: You can send and receive emails regarding order status or any other key details within the app. This keeps communication organized.
• Quotes: You can create tailored quotes by adding or removing products and adjusting prices. You can then share them via email, save them locally or in the cloud, or forward them internally.
• Customized catalog:  You can personalize the buying experience by setting rules on which products customers or sales reps can view. This ensures each user sees only what’s relevant.
• Customized pricing:  You can assign price lists or pricing rules so every buyer sees an individualized price. This gives you flexible control over pricing strategies.

8. Acumatica: Best for wholesale integrations

Acumatica is a platform built to support wholesale distribution businesses by offering complete control over procurement and selling to the wholesaler. It helps them manage their supply and demand through modules for omnichannel sales, optimizing inventory levels, and an in-built WMS application to improve warehouse efficiency. The software integrates with hundreds of software such as CRMs for connecting sales data, advanced reporting tools for generating actionable insights, and accounting applications to simplify financial management. 

Key features

• Automated cross-company transactions: You can manage intercompany operations by automatically generating a sales order in one entity from a purchase order in another. This reduces manual effort and smoothens cross-company workflows.
• Build matrix items: This feature simplifies product management by creating and organizing product families with attributes like size, style, or color. This makes purchasing and sales more efficient while keeping inventory easy to manage.
• Cost control: Acumatica gives you a detailed view of profitability by warehouse, product line, location, and business unit. These insights help monitor expenses and maintain tighter control across the supply and distribution chain.
• Sales orders management: This module optimizes quotes, entries, and fulfillments. You can set flexible rules to manage complex needs such as multiple warehouses, returns, credit limits, drop shipments, and order allocation across sales channels.

9. Brightpearl: Best for hybrid brands

Brightpearl is a distribution software designed for both wholesale and retail businesses.  The platform unifies an array of inventory and distribution processes, so that the users have an instant overview of day-to-day operations. The platform simplifies multichannel selling by automatically updating orders and inventory levels across phone, email, and webstore channels. Brightpearl also offers ready-made integrations with platforms like NuORDER, Joor, and Le New Black, so that there is a single source of truth for all order and customer-related information.

Key features

• Invoice support: Brightpearl supports different types of invoices and payment methods, such as proforma invoices, true invoices, payments on account, deposits, and part payments.
• Custom price lists: This feature lets you manage individual price lists by account, by group of accounts, or even by salesperson.
• Inventory planner: This capability of Brightpearl provides clear insights into when to reorder stock. It ensures you avoid shortages or excess and also centralizes purchase orders and supplier details in one place for easier inventory management.
• Smart reporting: Brightpearl ensures all users get a view of which clients owe payments and how long balances have been outstanding. There is also a tagging system that highlights key details such as statement dates, account status, and dunning letter references for quick follow-up.

10. Handifox – Best for inventory control

Handifox is a wholesale distribution software with a strong focus on inventory management. The platform is used by wholesalers to automate core operations like purchasing, sales, and typical warehouse workflows. For instance, the platform automates stock counts and purchase orders to let your warehouse team focus on other critical activities. It offers both cloud-based (HandiFox Online) and on-premise (HandiFox Desktop) options.

Key features

• High-volume inventory control: The platform offers support for managing thousands of SKUs across multiple warehouse locations. This allows wholesalers to track stock in each location accurately.
• Smart reordering: This automated feature helps wholesalers replenish their stock on time to avoid stockout situations. 
• Mobile access: This feature was designed mainly to enable warehouse teams to receive, pick, and ship orders faster and to reduce their reliance on desktops and other stationary setups for order management. 
• QuickBooks sync: The platform offers tight integration with QuickBooks so that inventory and financial data always stay aligned.

Final verdict: WizCommerce leads the way in wholesale distribution

We’ve explored ten strong contenders in the wholesale distribution space, and one platform clearly stands out: WizCommerce. It is currently the best software for wholesale distribution and is solely dedicated to simplifying all the day-to-day operations from the word go. Whether it is streamlining inventory management or helping wholesalers with data-driven insights, the platform makes sure you have everything you need to scale your distribution and gain a strong footing in the crowded business-to-business selling space. To know more about WizCommerce and how it can help with your wholesale distribution, book a demo now.

Frequently asked questions

1. What software do wholesalers use?

Wholesalers often rely on a distribution management software that is specifically designed to meet the unique needs of B2B businesses. Unlike standard retail tools, these platforms are built to handle bulk orders, tiered pricing, complex catalogs, and customer-specific discounts across various industries. A classic example is WizCommerce, which goes beyond simple inventory tracking. It, instead, automates and streamlines a variety of business operations, from bulk order processing to offering real-time inventory updates.

2. How to run a wholesale distribution business?

Running a wholesale distribution business successfully involves executing several key processes without friction. These typically include sourcing products at competitive prices, customer management, maintaining and displaying accurate inventory, and utilizing advanced distribution software like WizCommerce for automating various day-to-day manual operations. 

3. What is a distribution software?

Distribution software is a digital solution that helps wholesale distribution companies manage the movement of goods from suppliers to retailers. It typically includes advanced inventory tracking, order management, pricing, accounting, warehouse control, and reporting features to improve efficiency in supply chain operations.

4. What is a software that is used in a warehouse or distribution center?

Warehouses and distribution centers often use Warehouse Management Software, an ERP software, or distribution management software. All these platforms typically focus on optimizing inventory control, picking, packing, and shipping, improving accuracy and productivity across business processes.

5. Is wholesale distribution a good business?

Yes, wholesale distribution can be profitable since it connects manufacturers with retailers through your business, and you gain a smart profit for facilitating this connection. With growing ecommerce and demand for efficient supply chains and reducing operational costs, opportunities are strong in this model. However, success depends on operational efficiency and adapting to market trends.

6. What are the disadvantages of wholesale distribution?

Disadvantages of wholesale distribution include thin profit margins, high competition, dependency on suppliers, and rising logistics costs, all of which can be detrimental to your business growth. Managing inventory risks, fluctuating demand, and delayed payments from retailers can also strain cash flow, making careful planning essential. Many of these disadvantages can be overcome by business owners using a strong wholesale distribution software like WizCommerce.