Can AI take wholesale from curiosity to competitive advantage? Paul Hill speaks to Filshill chief executive and AI trainer Simon Hannah about what the technology can bring to the channel
For Simon Hannah, there is a “real and genuine buzz” around AI across all sectors globally, with every article leading us to believe that AI is going to disrupt all our industries.
However, he accepts that it is a “highly emotional subject matter for leaders and employees”, adding: “Are we late to the game? Do we have the right skill sets across the business to implement AI? Is AI going to replace all our jobs? Where do we start?”
He explains: “The wholesale sector, as we are all fully aware, is a low-margin, high-turnover business, and marginal gains and increased efficiency are the difference between turning a fair profit and washing our faces.”
Meanwhile, government policy changes have put serious pressure on all sectors in terms of the cost of running a business. Hannah says: “The forthcoming hike in employer National Insurance contributions and national living wage will have a significant impact if we just keep doing the same thing.”
This is where AI can be a real opportunity for our sector, he believes. “As a collective, we are more data-focused,” he points out. “Our alignment with our suppliers is very much based on data sharing and optimising the output of what that data is telling us – we use that data to ultimately create excellence in front of the shopper, working with our retail customers.
“AI can generate greater efficiency, higher productivity and, ultimately, give us a fighting chance of mitigating some of these significant cost increases while remaining relevant in the future.”
Training
But how is he qualified to talk on this subject? Hannah, an active member of global leadership organisation YPO, explains: “In October 2024, I had very little knowledge of AI, but was incredibly curious. I decided to do something about that curiosity and flew to Dubai to be trained on AI through a retail lens with the VJAL Institute [which works with global business leaders to harness the transformative power of AI].
“Through my membership of YPO, I then committed to a further visit to Dubai to become at AI trainer for the YPO Retail Network – training YPO CEOs and their executive teams on the journey of going from ‘AI curious to AI Serious’.”
Hannah, who believes that he is currently the only person in UK wholesale who runs a wholesale business and is a formal AI trainer, too, cautions that “AI is not an IT project”, adding: “It is a tool to support and enable the implementation of a strategy – it is not the strategy.
“Implementation of AI in any business is a culture shift towards a digitised world, bringing everyone in the company on that cultural journey shift.”
To that end, Hannah believes that accountability for AI implementation in any business, given that it is about a culture shift, sits firmly within the chief executive’s remit.
“It should be led by them and should be at the heart of any business strategy as an enabler,” he says. “Upskilling all colleagues is essential and, if being realistic, will take three-to-five years to start having a company structure where daily use of AI is the norm.
“Would we employ someone today into our sales or commercial teams who couldn’t use the internet or send an email? How long will that remain the case for being able to use AI? Those who embrace AI early will win.”
From Hannah’s perspective, AI is not something to fear, and he points to ChatGPT and other large language models (LLM) that are simple to use once you know how to structure your prompts.
He adds: “This is the starting point for anyone. Create clarity on the expertise and the experience that you are seeking help on, articulate who you are and who your business services, upload relevant data and be clear on what your enquiry is seeking to achieve. Importantly, ask ChatGPT for any clarifying questions.”
Uses within wholesale
According to Hannah, there are “almost unlimited” uses for AI using LLMs in wholesale if businesses can embrace the culture shift.
From accelerating HR functions on recruitment and policy reviews, creating marketing strategies and implementation plans by social media platforms, predicting more accurate forecasting for procurement and sales, aligning multi-company joint business plans in order to achieve category growth for customers, to analysing company performance using large data sets to help identify areas for improvement – the list goes on.
“We need to be very clear, of course, about how we protect our company data, and make sure that we have policies and processes in place to ensure our sensitive data is not going into the public domain via free LLMs,” Hannah cautions.
“But the upside to using AI freely across our businesses will be game-changing in time.”
And his advice to anyone who is AI-curious? “FAFO (fool around and find out), get onto ChatGPT, run some prompts and witness the power of what is at our fingertips.”
Hannah has allocated 10 days of his time in 2025 to take 10 suppliers on the ‘AI Curious to AI Serious’ journey for up to 40 of their colleagues in return for a contribution to the Filshill 150th Anniversary charity fund.
He says: “Please do reach out if you are interested. These newfound skills I have will not only be used to take my business, our colleagues’ and our customers’ businesses to the next level – but that of key stakeholders in the spirit of co-prosperity and delivering success.”
