A 130-year-old furnace maker has become a $5.2 billion climate-control platform. Its real advantage is not the metal box outside the house - it is the dealer network, parts shelf and service loop wrapped around it.
Ferguson built a $31 billion business around a stubbornly physical promise: when a contractor needs the right valve, fitting or air handler, the answer cannot arrive next week. Its real product is certainty - inventory, expertise and last-mile execution wrapped around more than a million parts.