While the pandemic was the single most important news topic of the past year, the most-read individual news items on mdm.com during 2020 were related to executive appointments and mergers and acquisitions — especially among the companies on MDM’s Top Distributors list.

Here are the news items that generated the most clicks on our website in the past year.

1. Ferguson to Acquire Columbia Pipe & Supply (Feb. 20) — Ferguson PLC, a specialist distributor of plumbing and heating products and parent company of Ferguson Enterprises, Newport News, Virginia, the largest plumbing distributor in the U.S., agreed to acquire Columbia Pipe & Supply Co., Chicago.
2. Genuine Parts Co. Sells S.P. Richards Co. (June 30) — Genuine Parts Co., Atlanta, Georgia, announced that it has completed the sale of its S.P. Richards operations through two separate transactions. Genuine Parts sold S.P. Richards’ core U.S. operations to an investor group and it sold S.P. Richards’ Supply Source Enterprises business operations — The Safety Zone and Impact Products — to an affiliate of H.I.G. Capital.
3. Ingersoll-Rand Industrial and Gardner Denver Have Merged (March 1) — Gardner Denver Holdings Inc. completed the merger with the Ingersoll Rand Industrial segment. The newly combined company, named Ingersoll Rand Inc., began trading March 2 on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “IR.”
4. MSC Industrial Supply Appoints New Director (Sept. 8) — The board of directors of MSC Industrial Supply Co., a Melville, New York-based MRO distributor, appointed Rudina Seseri to serve as a director.
5. ORS Nasco and MEDCO Name President & CEO (Jan. 8) — ORS Nasco, a wholesaler of industrial and safety supplies, and MEDCO, a wholesale distributor of automotive aftermarket tools and collision repair products, named Kevin Short as president and CEO. The two companies were acquired by One Equity Partners from Essendant in October 2019.
6. MSC Industrial Supply Names VP for Cross-Channel Growth (Nov. 20) — Industrial distributor MSC Industrial Supply Co. (NYSE: MSM), Melville, New York and Davidson, North Carolina, on Friday announced it has appointed Mark Pickett as vice president, cross-channel growth.
7. BlackHawk Acquires Machine Tools Supply (Feb. 4) — Metalworking and industrial supplies distributor BlackHawk Industrial, Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, acquired Machine Tools Supply (MTS), previously a subsidiary of DNOW.
8. WESCO International and Anixter International Announce Merger (Jan. 14) — WESCO International Inc., Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and Anixter International Inc., Glenview, Illinois, announced that their boards of directors unanimously approved a definitive merger agreement under which WESCO will acquire Anixter in a transaction valued at approximately $4.5 billion. Anixter’s prior agreement to be acquired by Clayton, Dubilier & Rice LLC was terminated.
9. Ingersoll-Rand Announces Details for Spin-Off, Merger of Industrial Segment (Feb. 14) — Ingersoll-Rand PLC, Swords, Ireland, announced that it has set a record date of Feb. 24 for the proposed spin-off of its industrial segment. The spin-off and the previously announced merger are expected to be completed on Feb. 29, subject to certain remaining conditions including the approval by the stockholders of Gardner Denver Holdings Inc.
10. ABC Supply Acquires Exterior Building Supply (March 16) — Building products distributor ABC Supply Co. Inc., Beloit, WI, acquired Exterior Building Supply, Meridian, Idaho, a distributor of siding, gutters and other exterior building materials.