CDW's moat isn't price — it's the relationships, expertise, and services that make customers keep coming back.
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✦ The bottom line
A moat keeps rivals out. CDW's is trusted relationships: it knows each customer's setup, so re-buying through CDW is easier than starting over elsewhere.
↓ the brief below
✦ Teach me
Switching costs
What a customer gives up to change suppliers. CDW's teams know a customer's systems, contracts, and history. Switching means re-explaining all of it to someone new — so customers tend to stay and buy more.
Wall Street calls this
Switching costs
Sticky relationships turn one-off hardware sales into repeat, higher-margin services.
From the 10-K · the position in the middle
...we are a leading sales channel partner for many original equipment manufacturers (“OEMs”), software publishers, and cloud providers...
↳ Translated: vendors need CDW to reach customers, customers need it to choose — a valuable spot.
Source · 10-K · Business — Vendor Partners · FY2025 · Filed Feb 20, 2026
The strategy is to sell more services — setup, security, cloud — atop the boxes. Services carry higher margins and lock customers in deeper than hardware.
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Relationship moat
A trusted-advisor position, not a price one — solid, but narrower than a data moat.