Last weekend, I needed to get some more joist hangers for the deck I’m building, so I head down to the local Home Depot. I had already bought about half the hangers I needed from them, so I was going back to buy the same brand so they would all match. As I approach the construction aisle, I see that the parts I needed were completely out. A small note stuck over the part label on the shelf told me to ‘Ask a sales representative for assistance’.

Just then, a ‘sales representative’ walked by, an older gentleman about 60 or so, with a handful of various parts and items. What follows is our conversation:

Me: “How’s it going today?”

Home Depot Employee(HDE): “Pretty crappy if you’re a Home Depot employee.”

Me: “Oh. Well, any chance you could help me? I need this part, but there’s a little sign here that says I should find an employee.”

HDE comes over, looks at it the shelf area I point to.

HDE: “Yeah, that means we’re out of those parts.”

Me: “Well, that’s a helpful sign.”

HDE: “Management doesn’t want to admit they are out of a part, and they put that there so if a customer wants it they can try to convince them to order it.”

Me: “Well, I kinda need it today. Any idea when you’ll be getting more?”

HDE: “Nope. The computer system is awful here. It can’t even keep track of returned parts, so it has no idea of the state of the inventory. It’s the same system we’ve had since they invented computers.”

Me: “Oh.”

HDE: “Yeah, and we aren’t even able to order our own parts. Everything has to be ordered through the main office in Atlanta, and they don’t have any idea what we do and don’t have.”

Me: “That seems inefficient.”

HDE: “Yup, and it won’t get any better until the idiot CEO running this company leaves. He’s too busy spending time at one of his 20 vacation homes.”

Me: “Why won’t they update the computer system”

HDE: “They’re too cheap to spend any money on improvements. Can’t pay yourself millions of dollars if you’re spending it on updating the computer system to something even remotely worthwhile.”

Me: “That sucks. Well, thanks for the help.”

That was either one disgruntled Home Depot associate, or there’s some serious problems at the orange-colored big box store. (Perhaps both!)

It would seem shareholders for Home Depot should indeed be a little worried about the $225 million over 5 years that Home Depot CEO Bob Nardelli has awarded himself for such outstanding work. It looks like Nardelli may soon be getting a little pay cut, courtesy of upset shareholders. For now, I guess I’ll be doing more shopping at Lowe’s, the store that was formerly Eagle, that had the cryptically kerned subtitle “moreo fever y thing”.

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