In 1991, a major national power tool manufacturer approached Paul Robichaud, co-owner of Robi Tool Sales Inc., with an ultimatum: Drop competing product lines or lose us as a supplier. At the time, the manufacturer supplied Robi Tools' second-best selling brand.

“They came in to see me and said, 'Paul, you've got to make decisions. You cannot have the variety of products you have. We don't work with anyone—you're just another account to us. You have to make a decision,'” Robichaud recalls. “I said, 'I just made a decision. I'm dropping your line, effective immediately.'”

“We did no business,” Paul Robichaud recalls. “We ended up not being able to buy product. Manufacturers were actually insulting to us.”

The turning point came a few years later, when he decided to leave Robert to hold down the fort and journey to Hanover, Germany, for its annual industrial fair. There, Robichaud made connections with manufacturers that have helped sustain the business ever since.

“I talked to people at a level I had no business talking to,” he says, explaining that because so few of the European tool makers' lower-level employees spoke English, Robichaud was introduced to senior executives. He developed those introductions into decades-long relationships and, in some cases, personal friendships, traveling back to the fair every year for nearly 20 years. Those connections gave Robi Tool a significant edge over the competition, Robichaud says now.

“If there was something new that was going to enter the U.S. market, it was there one or two years before it entered the U.S.,” he explains. “That's what kept us in business.”

Since then, the business has expanded to include 12 employees (including eight mechanics) and three more branches: Power Tool and Fastener Inc. of Amherst, N.H., acquired 28 years ago, and two Robi Tool branches in Needham and Middleborough, Mass. And though the residential housing slump precipitated a sales decline of about 25 percent last year, to just under $3 million, Robichaud says the concept of working harder, not smarter, will continue to sustain the business.

“When times are good, everyone's intelligent,” he says. “When times are hard, like they are now, everyone's looking for answers.”

One factor that's kept Robi Tool going is flexibility. After the Home Depot opened a large store a scant half-mile from the Robichaud's Somerville headquarters, the distributor pared its product line from 21 to seven and decided not to go after any repairs business that might have come from HD's customers.

“Their product mix is very different from mine,” Paul Robichaud notes. “I would have to stock parts for that. By my trying to support what they sell, I would be homogenizing Robi Tool and taking away from what we sell—good quality and service at the right price.”

Today, as Home Depot's business shrinks from the housing downturn, Robichaud predicts good things for small, independent distributors.

“[Home Depot] has been a great competitor. They've been an innovator,” he says. “But my belief is that, in the next five years for the specialist, brick-and-mortar distributor, we will have an easier time than the last five years. The manufacturers that have gotten heavily involved with Home Depot because the volume [of sales] was great [are discovering] that the cost of doing business was even greater and that there's no loyalty whatsoever.”

As an example, Robichaud cites Stanley Works, which last year lost a significant chunk of business after the home improvement retail giant decided to drop Stanley's line of locks and related hardware in favor of its own, private-label brand.

The move illustrates another important plank in the Robi Tool platform: Cultivate relationships with suppliers as assiduously as you cultivate customers.

“That gives me an ear when I have a problem. We can work it out together,” he says. “My feeling is that the independent distributor should take a very hard look at the independent manufacturers. Don't get carried away by the rebates from the large manufacturers. You have to get to know them and support them. Whether they're 5 percent too high or inconvenient to do business with, work it out. It's in the wholesale independents' interest to do this. … You both have to make concessions, work together and make it personal.”

That attitude has enticed Bob Fitta to continue doing business with Robi Tool for more than three decades. A manufacturers' representative for companies including Metabo Power Tools, German levels maker Stabila and Norseman Drills, Fitta says the key to the success of the longstanding relationship is “mutual trust.”

“We sometimes kid one another that we're dinosaurs in the business, because we think that there has to be a strong working relationship for the common good of both distributor and rep,” Fitta explains. “I grew up in the business many years ago with the old Nicholson File Company, which is part of Cooper [Industries] now. In those days you worked very, very closely with distributors. Traditional dealers like Paul are under pressure by the Internet and the big box [dealers] right now, but to me they are the type of account that brings something to the table for the end user. They solve problems. … Paul [is] the type of individual that would size up product lines very wisely and decide what lines would do well for his business. We became friends. I got to know him as a business person and a real person and that relationship has endured.”

For Charlie Mallet, sales manager for saw blade manufacturer Disston Co., the 15-year relationship with Robi Tool is founded on the same idea.

“He's probably one of the best people I've worked with in the industry,” Mallet says. “What it all boils down to is, it's a people business and he's one of the people I like working with.”

John Vogel, vice president of U.S. sales for Atlas Copco Construction Tools, has been a Robi Tool supplier for more than 20 years.

“I think [Robi Tools'] value is the support he gives the products. Anyone can provide the product, but he can repair it and guide users on applications. Even the best products need repair at some point,” Vogel says. “He has a very strong, loyal following and he uses the fact that he can repair the products and get customers out of a jam. His repair people are particularly clever. You get some of these repair folks and when you send things in there, they sit around. The key is to be able to support the products by having the parts on the shelf. If you need it right way, he can turn it around.”

“They're under tremendous pressure financially right now and they just can't afford the buy-in from the big vendors,” Robichaud says.

One thing all Robi Tool customers have in common is the profits they bring. Robichaud's advice for distributors struggling with unprofitable customers is to send them packing.

“Why does your customer come to you? Because you solve problems. Do not solve problems over the phone with a customer who doesn't give you business. If that customer thinks you're time is worth nothing, then you need a new customer, no matter how big they might be,” he says. “If your time is worth money, we will help you make money. If your time is worth nothing, you have to go to Home Depot or on the Internet.”

Robi Tool has a home-grown computer solution that logs the history of each customer's purchases with the company. This helps the firm winnow the unprofitable customers out of the mix.

“Believe me, when you track them it's an eye-opener,” Robichaud says.

“The reality is that succession plans don't seem to work when you force it on the kids. My feeling is that there won't be none that will do it, but there won't be six,” Paul says. “I'm fortunate that I'm healthy. [Retirement] is five or 10 years down the road. I'm going to be doing it for 50 years. Any distributor that starts with the same owners and the same buyers and does business for 50 years—there aren't many that have done it and I'm proud of it. I've outlasted many of my suppliers.”

That includes the power tool manufacturer that delivered an ultimatum to Robi Tool 17 years ago. It's now owned by a Chinese industrial consortium.