Distributors and wholesalers in two-tier channels: plumbing and HVAC, electrical, agriculture, industrial, sporting goods, automotive aftermarket. You buy from the manufacturer, your dealers buy from you, and co-op has to pass through you to reach the people who actually run the ads.
Since 2018, 35 distributor-funded co-op programs have appeared on CoopConnect and 30 are active today, mostly HVAC supply houses and lawn and garden distributors: Gemaire, Goodin, Minnesota Air, US Air Conditioning Distributors, Empire Distributing, BROSCO, BDI Hearth, Carswell OEI. Distributors administering their own co-op did not exist as a category in 2018. Separately, one in six manufacturer plans routes co-op through a distributor: the manufacturer accrues on the distributor's purchases, and indirect dealers claim through the distributor with proof of purchase. That makes you an administrator by default, often without tools, staff, or reimbursement for the work. Some manufacturers only offer co-op to distributors, leaving you to decide how much reaches your dealers and how.
Source: the 2,171 manufacturer co-op plans listed on CoopConnect as of 2026, compared with the 7,489 plans in the 2018 RECAS export. Analysis by Co-Op Managers.
When the distributor is the funder, the distributor is the brand as far as we are concerned. We configure your rates, your caps, your eligible media, your proof rules, and your dealer list. Your dealers get a portal with a balance and pre-approved creative instead of a claim form. You get the reporting the manufacturer never gave you, and a program that costs a coordinator’s afternoon instead of a coordinator.
| Running it yourself today still the industry standard | Running it with us |
|---|---|
| A marketing coordinator tracks accruals in a spreadsheet and cuts checks quarterly. | Accrual posts from your invoices. Dealers spend from the balance in the portal. Nothing is cut. |
| Your program and the manufacturer’s program have different forms, deadlines, and proof rules. Dealers pick the easier one or neither. | Both programs run side by side in one portal, each with its own rules, and a dealer can fund one campaign from both. |
| The manufacturer has no idea your dealers ran anything. | The manufacturer sees the local activity its money produced, through you, which is how you get more of it next year. |
| The old way still the industry standard | Co-Op Managers |
|---|---|
| The manufacturer sees you. Your dealers are invisible to their program. | The program is configured with a distributor tier. Your balance, your dealers' balances, and the rules for passing funds down are all in the system. |
| Dealers send you invoices; you assemble claims for the manufacturer. | Dealers claim in the portal against funds allocated to them. Proof of purchase is your invoice to them, already on record. |
| You run your own co-op for your dealers on top of the manufacturer's, in a spreadsheet. | Your own distributor-funded program runs in the same system alongside the manufacturer's, with its own rules and reporting. |
| Nobody upstream knows what your dealers actually ran. | The manufacturer sees the local activity its money produced, through you, without you compiling it. |
We can manage a distributor-funded program for your dealers directly, since in that case you are the brand. For manufacturer programs, tell us which lines you carry and how their co-op reaches you today. Distributors who administer co-op by hand are among the strongest cases we can bring to a manufacturer.
We will tell you whether we manage any of their programs, and what you can do with the ones we do not.