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Strategy

Inside Grainger’s Assortment Engine: Curation, Private Label and the Power of Product Data

Grainger’s product advantage is not just SKU count. It is the company’s ability to curate complexity through merchandising discipline, supplier management, private label, standardization and product data. That’s the focus in the second of this three-part Grainger deep dive.

June 23, 2026

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Editor’s Note: This is the second in a three-part series that will later be packaged into MDM’s next Case Study report. See Part 1 here. Click on images for hi-res version.

Grainger’s assortment story is often told through big numbers. The company reported $17.9 billion in 2025 revenue, serves more than 4.6 million active customers, offers more than 35 million products globally and operates 33 distribution centers. But the more important story is not how large the assortment has become. It is how Grainger decides what belongs in it. That distinction matters because MRO is not a category where…

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