Sean McDonnell knows the materials handling equipment industry. He grew up around a family business involved with distributing parts for equipment like forklifts and cranes used to move containers in warehouses and shipping terminals. And now he’s brought his expertise online as CEO of TruPar.com, a business he founded several years ago in his Aspen, Colo., apartment.

McDonnell and TruPar have come a long way. Since launching TruPar in 2012 in his one-bedroom apartment near the ski mountains of Aspen, he has grown it into an international business selling millions of parts for forklifts and other equipment used to move heavy materials in such facilities as warehouses and shipping terminals.

McDonnell will speak about his journey into online selling in a session at the IRCE B2B Workshop on Friday, June 8. The session will explore how B2B e-commerce is disrupting industries like materials handling equipment.

TruPar is “breaking molds in how industrial distributors can compete online,” says Justin King, founder of the B2B resource site EcommerceandB2B.com and CEO of consultants B2X Partners, who will join McDonnell in the IRCE B2B Workshop session. “We’ll be talking about the opportunities we see for B2B e-commerce businesses looking to truly disrupt the space.”

In TruPar’s case, it has disrupted an established industry rooted in offline distribution with an e-commerce site that has grown to more than 8 million SKUs. It sells to an international base of more than 45,000 customers, and ships throughout the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Puerto Rico. For shipments to other countries, it provides information on how customers can find and work with freight forwarders. TruPar.com lets visitors choose among versions of the site available in the English, Spanish and French languages.

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