Gonna throw something in.

"Kyle Boatright" wrote in message
. ..

"frank1492" wrote in message
...
I used to take great joy in visiting HD, but over the past year it has
*Mart and HD, Walmart usually steps
all over HD on price.
I'm starting to dread going to HD.
Frank

HD is based here in Atlanta, so the local media gives them a fair amount
of
coverage. Some of the things which have come out in the last few years is
that the folks at the corporate office have more or less taken the power
away from the stores. Once upon a time, the store managers had a lot of
latitude on what to stock, how to price it, etc. Today, virtually all of
that is controlled at the corporate level. In addition, it has become
much
easier to get a job in one of the stores because the company has moved
away
from hiring experts for the respective departments (i.e. someone with
plumbing experience in the plumbing dept.).

You most likely won't find *real* pros in any department at HD or Lowes. A
good tradesman can make $18-$24 per hour (or more) in their respective
trade, maybe half of that at the box stores.

While HD hasn't devolved into
*just another retail store*, it isn't nearly as service and customer
oriented as it was a few years back.

The bottom line is that HD isn't what it used to be, although I still
prefer
it to Lowes and (uggh) Wal-mart.

HD was great when Bernie and Arthur ran it. Now that Nardelli, the General
Electric reject, runs it, the stores have turned to squat.