Distribution is one of the four elements of the famous marketing mix. It is about making your brand and product available for the consumer in the right place. Marketers use distribution metrics to clear up problems in the supply chain. Although these incredibly useful metrics have a number of variations, this post will cover the most frequently used in brand management: numeric distribution and weighted distribution. Analyzing just these two metrics will already provide a decent representation of your product’s availability. 

Numeric distribution refers to the percentage of stores selling your brand.  The value can be found by dividing the number of stores selling your brand by the total number of stores in the range (any particular area). To get the correct percentage, you’ll have to multiply that number by 100.

Let’s have a look at an example where we compare Brand A and Brand B:

Brand A is available in 4 out of 7 stores, whereas Brand B is available in 6 out of 7 stores.

Numeric distribution Brand A: 4/7 x 100 = 57.1%
Numeric distribution Brand B: 6/7 x 100 = 85.7%

In this example, we see that Brand B has a higher numeric distribution than Brand A. In other words: Brand B is wider available than Brand A. However, we know nothing about the quality of distribution. You get a better indication of the quality of distribution by weighing the stores. The weighted distribution shows your brand’s presence as a percentage of where money is spent in the category. In every market, there are different types of stores, and to increase your quality of distribution, you want to be present where your customers spend the most in your category.

Let’s have a look at the same example. We’ve added a column that represents the category sales per store.

Comparing the weighted distribution for Brand A and Brand B gives us the following:

Weighted distribution Brand A: (55+15+40+40)/(55+15+15+40+10+15+40) x 100 = 78.9%

Weighted distribution Brand B: (15+10+40+10+15+40)/(55+15+15+40+10+15+40) x 100 = 68.4%

We see that Brand A (78.9%) has a higher weighted distribution than Brand B (68.4%). Brand A is sold in stores which account for 78.9% of total category sales. Combining both metrics for both brands gives us the following result:

In our example, we can see that Brand B is present in more stores than brand A. However, Brand B isn’t present in the most important store in terms of category sales. This heavily impacts the brand’s weighted distribution. Therefore, Brand A has a better quality of distribution than Brand B.

Typically the weighted distribution of a brand is higher than its numeric distribution. Brands usually try to be available in the stores where consumers spend the most in their category. By identifying the gaps in your weighted distribution you can improve your presence in the right stores. However, if your strategy is to be available to your consumer everywhere, then you should focus on improving the numeric distribution metric.