One of the biggest distributors of plumbing supplies just finished another fiscal year with a strong online sales performance.

Bill Brundage, chief financial officer, Ferguson plc

Ferguson plc, based in the United Kingdom but with about 90% of its plumbing and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) sales in the United States, ended its 2021 fiscal year with an increase in total sales of 14.3% to $22.79 billion from $19.94 billion in fiscal 2020.

In the U.S, Ferguson also posted a gain in sales. For the fiscal year ended July 31, total sales in the U.S. grew 13.9% to $21.47 billion from $18.85 billion in fiscal 2020.

But U.S. ecommerce sales grew even faster, by 38%, to $2.147 billion from $1.560 billion in the prior year. Online sales, which Ferguson calls residential digital commerce, now accounts for about 10% of all U.S. sales, the company says.

Today, about 21% of Ferguson’s base of more than 1 million customers do their primary purchasing through ecommerce, compared with 68% in branches and 11% in showrooms. The company has a network of 1,679 branches.

“We saw strength in the residential end market and our customer groups serving that end market performed well,” chief financial officer Bill Brundage total analysts on Ferguson’s recent year-end earnings call. “Residential trade and residential building and remodel grew well, and we continue to see particularly strong trends in residential digital commerce, up 38% for the year due to strong demand from the project-minded consumer and light decorative professional.”

Ferguson made several upgrades and a few changes to its online business model in fiscal 2021, according to the company’s just-released annual report.

Among the changes:

• Renamed Build.com as Build with Ferguson, supported by a designated call center;
• Offered one-day delivery to most U.S. customers;
• Launched the Build with Ferguson platform, a home improvement tool designed to gather inspiration, plan, organize and collaborate with others in real-time.

“We continue to invest in talented associates in our global supply chain, product breadth and depth, and digital solutions,” CEO Kevin Murphy told analysts.

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