ALPS Distributors Inc.

ALPS Distributors Inc. is a distribution arm, the sort of company people meet through funds, products, and paperwork rather than a storefront. By our assessment, its strength is functional clarity: the name says it is there to move financial products through the channel, which is exactly the kind of role distributors play. The trade-off is that such firms can feel invisible to end users, because their work is buried behind the products they distribute. In practice that means forms, intermediaries, and a lot of administrative structure, not much warmth or personality. It sits below the public-facing asset manager and above the actual point of sale, which is a useful but not glamorous place. For someone looking for the machinery behind investment products, ALPS Distributors Inc. is understandable; for someone wanting a simple consumer brand, it is not.