October 5, 2007
Depot Tries to Make Women Feel at Home
It’s become the view of some observers of the DIY retailing world that Lowe’s is the retailer that caters to women while Home Depot is the place guys go to shop.
While the view is overly broad and simplistic, there is no doubt that Home Depot is exploring opportunities to get in touch with its feminine side sufficiently enough to get women to spend more in its stores.
One such attempt will come later this month at two new Home Depot Design Center format stores opening in Concord, Calif., and Charlotte, N.C.
The stores, according to a report by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, will be the same size of typical Home Depots but will differ in virtually every other respect.
“Nothing about this store feels like the Home Depot you know today. It feels much more like a studio environment,” Jason Feldman, the company’s senior director of merchandising, told the paper. “Imagine a Home Depot designed by a woman.”
Joe Feldman, managing director of the Telsey Advisory Group, said the test was based on the business imperative of attracting female shoppers. “Women make 80 percent of the buying decisions on home improvement projects, so it only makes sense,” he told the Journal-Constitution.
Among the changes in the new stores will be moving from Home Depot orange to earth tones. Ceilings will be lower and conference desks will be on the floor for customers to discuss design issues with employees.
With the new format, Home Depot seems resigned to the notion that it cannot serve its traditional contractor customers and female consumers under a single roof. The new units, for example, will not sell lumber and power tools but will have roughly 11,000-square-feet dedicated to furniture.
“The only reason a contractor would come into these stores is if a customer asked him to pick up tiles or counter tops or something like that for a project,” Mr. Feldman told the Journal-Constitution. “Otherwise, if a contractor walks in and thinks this is a Home Depot, he’s going to turn around and walk right back out. The beauty is, we’ve put these two stores a couple of miles away from the [regular stores], so we’ve still got something nearby that focuses on the core do-it-yourselfer and the pros.”
Home Depot is not publicly looking beyond the test locations at this juncture. “It’s two stores and two stores only right now in a couple of markets where we thought it would make sense,” Mr. Feldman said. “Everything we’re testing right now is really about finding out what works in a particular geography, and seeing if there are pieces that work that we can transfer somewhere else.”
The Telsey Advisory Group’s Feldman said, “They’ve been much more vigilant on the core retail business. Historically, Home Depot has always been willing to try things but a concern is that they hang on too long with their tests, instead of cutting bait and moving on, but maybe they’re getting better.”
Discussion Questions: Is the perception accurate that Home Depot does not address the needs of female shoppers in the majority of its stores? Is it possible for DIY stores to successfully sell to both contractors and female consumers under the same roof or do separate stores make better sense?
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I don’t think Home Depot only ignores the needs of its female customers. The retailer seems to ignore the needs of all of their customers. Their lack of helpfulness is not gender specific. You can spend precious minutes looking for someone who wears an orange apron, only to find that they are “busy” and unable to help. The signage in the stores is horrendous. They should have computer kiosks throughout the store with search capabilities that allow the customer to search for a product, and find it via a store locater. The list of problems is too long to comment here.
Opening up prototype stores is not the answer. Focusing on the customer (all genders) in their current stores will serve Home Depot significantly better.
I’m curious to see how the test stores do. Will they have a different name? I’m not sure how women will feel about buying their furniture from The Home Depot. Likewise, to have a designer from The Home Depot…. I’m a big believer in focusing on what you are good at and being the best at that. Lowe’s does not attract women shoppers by having separate furniture stores, they simply provide more areas in their stores that are gender neutral. In addition, their customer service is more gender neutral. I go to The Home Depot from time to time because they seem to have everything we need for our house. But when I walk in, I feel like I’m invading a man’s territory. Employees and customers always seem to be looking at me like “what’s that woman doing in here?” I get the same feeling while passing construction sites or going to 84 Lumber. So I tend to want my husband with me when I shop there. If he doesn’t come, I simply run in with my list, get what I need and get out. If The Home Depot could eliminate that “feeling” perhaps women will stay longer, browse and spend more money.
They don’t need separate home improvement stores for women. That would be a real estate nightmare, for sure. The store would soon be vacant like those Curves health clubs that try to cater only to women. The perception is accurate that the DIY stores do not address the needs of female shoppers.
I have a client who really seems to understand the female shopper. Women, as to do men, will tend to want shop and be around people who make them feel good about themselves. Selling to women is much different than selling to men which any good salesman will tell you. There are tactful ways to make women feel comfortable shopping without crossing the line and venturing into sexual harassment. DYI retailers need to communicate with the female shopper differently than with men. For example as a man, I would never tell male shopper how nice his shoes match his pants. That would get a punch in the nose. Without getting into specifics which I know will be criticized, the key to keeping women coming back more is to keep them feeling good about themselves. That applies to just about any kind of retailing.
I agree completely with Mark Lilien that all Home Depot really needs to do is make some fundamental improvements. And as a woman, the most important would be increased quantity and quality of sales help. What is it they say, men don’t ask directions and women do, right? Perhaps the men that shop at Home Depot don’t need help, but when I go into a Home Depot, I usually need to ask how to find something and, on some level, how to do what it is I’m trying to do. I want to DIY, and I’m game to try, but I need some guidance. Finding help in that store is like searching for a needle in a haystack. And then once you find someone, they often bounce you to someone else to answer your question.
A clearly visible store directory (maybe on the shopping carts, like in the grocery store) and more clearly and accurately marked prices would help too.
And their auto check out does not work nearly as well as some I’ve seen. GlitchesRUs. Improve their technology and they’ll speed check out.
Have a separate store for women without power tools and lumber because they don’t purchase those items? Have they looked at their scanner data?
I agree on the staffing issue of Home Depot, partially. I don’t know how many complaints I have sent into HD for just rude, unknowledgeable employees. I am a woman but I do the “man’s role” around my house, I spackle, cut wood and fix the garbage disposal just as good as every other Joe, but I know when I go to HD to get the tools for the job I know I am going into it alone. I think besides everyones point of the scarcely scattered employees not knowing where anything is or the know-how, they just plainly ignore women in the store. I actually drag my husband there just so I can be acknowledged.
This spring, a friend and I were at Home Depot picking up this and that for both our condos. Neither of us guys is a contractor. We had a simple question. Can you use a dimmer with a fluorescent light fixture? Tracking down an employee in the light department who knew the answer to this question was like looking for the holy grail. That is why I now go several miles out of my way past not one, but two Home Depots in Chicago to go to Lowe’s in a nearby suburb. This issue isn’t related only to hardware. It’s related to all retailers. Spacious dressing rooms, adequate lighting, smart floorplans, etc. mean nothing if a retailer hasn’t invested in knowledgeable, helpful staff. Your staff will make or break you.
I make my living doing niche marketing, or at least niche market research. That being said, count me in with the consensus. There is no need for Home Depot to develop special stores for women.
I go to both Home Depot and Lowe’s all the time. And as a consumer, I hate them both. I dread going to those stores. They are constantly out of stock and God help the do-it-yourselfer, male or female, who needs help.
There have been countless times when I’ve been in either one of these stores and I think of RW. I think of all the retailers we write about, all the retailers trying to do a job. And I wonder what is wrong with these two companies. They both have conscientious people willing to help, and I’ve been so grateful when I’ve been able to find one of them. But those opportunities are few and far between. Mostly, shopping at Home Depot and Lowe’s sucks.
Home Depot and Lowe’s, read Joel Warady’s comments. You “ignore the needs of all” your customers. Your “lack of helpfulness is not gender specific.” Changing to earth tones is not going to do it.
And David Livingston, I assume what you wrote is meant as irony. Would you really tell a female shopper how nicely her shoes match her pants? You’ve got to be either a satirist or in the lady’s shoe business. Otherwise, I’d say you’re about as much fun as a Sunday afternoon in the checkout line at a Home Depot.
Separate stores make sense to some degree. Home Depot already tried this with mixed success at its Expo Design Centers. Another idea is for separate sections that have greater appeal to women and other consumers inside regular stores, possibly with a separate entrance. It’s the old store-within-a-store concept.
However, nothing is going to work out if they simply have the same old lousy front-end operation with outdated equipment and clerks who work in reverse.
Lowe’s is a perfect example of one store working with both contractors and women DIY’s. Lowe’s has concentrated on the staff. Home Depot is concentrating on the wrong issue, it’s not the aesthetics which is nice to have but it’s the attitude and experience of the staff. Women that are engaged in DIY projects want advice from knowledgeable, experienced help. They want to be able to shop for the what-u-call-it things without feeling stupid and get advice on how to install, use or fix the whatjamacallit!
Lowe’s has focused in several areas with mini-seminars. You can learn how to tile, wallpaper, faux paint, do minor plumbing jobs and you are taught by someone that knows what they are dong. If by chance you get someone that doesn’t know, they find you someone that does…imagine that…customer service!
All shoppers, regardless of gender, have similar priorities: short cashier lines, readily available skilled employees to answer questions, prices clearly marked, in-stock assortment wide enough to finish all the elements of the job, low prices. Home Depot would probably do best by strengthening its core business by keeping the building materials, upgrading its staff on the floor (quantity and quality, both), shortening the cashier lines, and improving the clarity of its price marking. Major sales improvements would also come from quick turnaround for special order items and installation, both of which often take too long. These efforts wouldn’t be easy, but they’d appeal to everyone.
“Lowe’s for women,” and “Home Depot for men,” are myths, however, there is some truth behind the misnomer. Lowe’s appeals to more women then does Home Depot, however Lowe’s also appeals to real men like myself that don’t eat quiche. The reason: I am a busy businessman that has neither training nor much interest in carpentry, painting, or plumbing. But I do have needs in my home that must be dealt with and I need a user-friendly store for shopping, and assistance and I get that at Lowe’s. So there! Now, give me a beer (burp!)
Wow! Rarely have I seen the RW commentator crew so uniformly in agreement–and so absolutely spot-on correct in this commentator’s opinion. HD’s problem is all about the STAFF, not that the store layout is a pageantry mind you–but it is called “Depot.” Neither women nor men enter the store expecting to find “design centers.” And speaking of that, how will this store be different from the “Expo” experiment? That was also a “design oriented” and “female friendly” format, right? And in the case of the unit in Vernon Hills–it was in the same strip center as the Home Depot. You can literally walk from one to the other in seconds.
To reiterate my whole-hearted agreement with those above, HD should concentrate on raising the service levels in all regards and the results will come, from both male and female shoppers alike who don’t have quite as much “DI” in the “Y” as they think they do. One last footnote, over the past month or so my local HD seems to have about three times the normal staff level on the floor whenever I go in. I wonder if this is serendipity or strategy?
Home Depot’s new format sounds appealing. Maybe having more female employees offering design and decorating advice on home remodeling would be a logical extension to the concept.
However, having two different formats might be confusing to consumers unless the differences were clearly explained and have a different name to differentiate them.
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I don’t think Home Depot only ignores the needs of its female customers. The retailer seems to ignore the needs of all of their customers. Their lack of helpfulness is not gender specific. You can spend precious minutes looking for someone who wears an orange apron, only to find that they are “busy” and unable to help. The signage in the stores is horrendous. They should have computer kiosks throughout the store with search capabilities that allow the customer to search for a product, and find it via a store locater. The list of problems is too long to comment here.
Opening up prototype stores is not the answer. Focusing on the customer (all genders) in their current stores will serve Home Depot significantly better.
I’m curious to see how the test stores do. Will they have a different name? I’m not sure how women will feel about buying their furniture from The Home Depot. Likewise, to have a designer from The Home Depot…. I’m a big believer in focusing on what you are good at and being the best at that. Lowe’s does not attract women shoppers by having separate furniture stores, they simply provide more areas in their stores that are gender neutral. In addition, their customer service is more gender neutral. I go to The Home Depot from time to time because they seem to have everything we need for our house. But when I walk in, I feel like I’m invading a man’s territory. Employees and customers always seem to be looking at me like “what’s that woman doing in here?” I get the same feeling while passing construction sites or going to 84 Lumber. So I tend to want my husband with me when I shop there. If he doesn’t come, I simply run in with my list, get what I need and get out. If The Home Depot could eliminate that “feeling” perhaps women will stay longer, browse and spend more money.
They don’t need separate home improvement stores for women. That would be a real estate nightmare, for sure. The store would soon be vacant like those Curves health clubs that try to cater only to women. The perception is accurate that the DIY stores do not address the needs of female shoppers.
I have a client who really seems to understand the female shopper. Women, as to do men, will tend to want shop and be around people who make them feel good about themselves. Selling to women is much different than selling to men which any good salesman will tell you. There are tactful ways to make women feel comfortable shopping without crossing the line and venturing into sexual harassment. DYI retailers need to communicate with the female shopper differently than with men. For example as a man, I would never tell male shopper how nice his shoes match his pants. That would get a punch in the nose. Without getting into specifics which I know will be criticized, the key to keeping women coming back more is to keep them feeling good about themselves. That applies to just about any kind of retailing.
I agree completely with Mark Lilien that all Home Depot really needs to do is make some fundamental improvements. And as a woman, the most important would be increased quantity and quality of sales help. What is it they say, men don’t ask directions and women do, right? Perhaps the men that shop at Home Depot don’t need help, but when I go into a Home Depot, I usually need to ask how to find something and, on some level, how to do what it is I’m trying to do. I want to DIY, and I’m game to try, but I need some guidance. Finding help in that store is like searching for a needle in a haystack. And then once you find someone, they often bounce you to someone else to answer your question.
A clearly visible store directory (maybe on the shopping carts, like in the grocery store) and more clearly and accurately marked prices would help too.
And their auto check out does not work nearly as well as some I’ve seen. GlitchesRUs. Improve their technology and they’ll speed check out.
Have a separate store for women without power tools and lumber because they don’t purchase those items? Have they looked at their scanner data?
I agree on the staffing issue of Home Depot, partially. I don’t know how many complaints I have sent into HD for just rude, unknowledgeable employees. I am a woman but I do the “man’s role” around my house, I spackle, cut wood and fix the garbage disposal just as good as every other Joe, but I know when I go to HD to get the tools for the job I know I am going into it alone. I think besides everyones point of the scarcely scattered employees not knowing where anything is or the know-how, they just plainly ignore women in the store. I actually drag my husband there just so I can be acknowledged.
This spring, a friend and I were at Home Depot picking up this and that for both our condos. Neither of us guys is a contractor. We had a simple question. Can you use a dimmer with a fluorescent light fixture? Tracking down an employee in the light department who knew the answer to this question was like looking for the holy grail. That is why I now go several miles out of my way past not one, but two Home Depots in Chicago to go to Lowe’s in a nearby suburb. This issue isn’t related only to hardware. It’s related to all retailers. Spacious dressing rooms, adequate lighting, smart floorplans, etc. mean nothing if a retailer hasn’t invested in knowledgeable, helpful staff. Your staff will make or break you.
I make my living doing niche marketing, or at least niche market research. That being said, count me in with the consensus. There is no need for Home Depot to develop special stores for women.
I go to both Home Depot and Lowe’s all the time. And as a consumer, I hate them both. I dread going to those stores. They are constantly out of stock and God help the do-it-yourselfer, male or female, who needs help.
There have been countless times when I’ve been in either one of these stores and I think of RW. I think of all the retailers we write about, all the retailers trying to do a job. And I wonder what is wrong with these two companies. They both have conscientious people willing to help, and I’ve been so grateful when I’ve been able to find one of them. But those opportunities are few and far between. Mostly, shopping at Home Depot and Lowe’s sucks.
Home Depot and Lowe’s, read Joel Warady’s comments. You “ignore the needs of all” your customers. Your “lack of helpfulness is not gender specific.” Changing to earth tones is not going to do it.
And David Livingston, I assume what you wrote is meant as irony. Would you really tell a female shopper how nicely her shoes match her pants? You’ve got to be either a satirist or in the lady’s shoe business. Otherwise, I’d say you’re about as much fun as a Sunday afternoon in the checkout line at a Home Depot.
Separate stores make sense to some degree. Home Depot already tried this with mixed success at its Expo Design Centers. Another idea is for separate sections that have greater appeal to women and other consumers inside regular stores, possibly with a separate entrance. It’s the old store-within-a-store concept.
However, nothing is going to work out if they simply have the same old lousy front-end operation with outdated equipment and clerks who work in reverse.
Lowe’s is a perfect example of one store working with both contractors and women DIY’s. Lowe’s has concentrated on the staff. Home Depot is concentrating on the wrong issue, it’s not the aesthetics which is nice to have but it’s the attitude and experience of the staff. Women that are engaged in DIY projects want advice from knowledgeable, experienced help. They want to be able to shop for the what-u-call-it things without feeling stupid and get advice on how to install, use or fix the whatjamacallit!
Lowe’s has focused in several areas with mini-seminars. You can learn how to tile, wallpaper, faux paint, do minor plumbing jobs and you are taught by someone that knows what they are dong. If by chance you get someone that doesn’t know, they find you someone that does…imagine that…customer service!
All shoppers, regardless of gender, have similar priorities: short cashier lines, readily available skilled employees to answer questions, prices clearly marked, in-stock assortment wide enough to finish all the elements of the job, low prices. Home Depot would probably do best by strengthening its core business by keeping the building materials, upgrading its staff on the floor (quantity and quality, both), shortening the cashier lines, and improving the clarity of its price marking. Major sales improvements would also come from quick turnaround for special order items and installation, both of which often take too long. These efforts wouldn’t be easy, but they’d appeal to everyone.
“Lowe’s for women,” and “Home Depot for men,” are myths, however, there is some truth behind the misnomer. Lowe’s appeals to more women then does Home Depot, however Lowe’s also appeals to real men like myself that don’t eat quiche. The reason: I am a busy businessman that has neither training nor much interest in carpentry, painting, or plumbing. But I do have needs in my home that must be dealt with and I need a user-friendly store for shopping, and assistance and I get that at Lowe’s. So there! Now, give me a beer (burp!)
Wow! Rarely have I seen the RW commentator crew so uniformly in agreement–and so absolutely spot-on correct in this commentator’s opinion. HD’s problem is all about the STAFF, not that the store layout is a pageantry mind you–but it is called “Depot.” Neither women nor men enter the store expecting to find “design centers.” And speaking of that, how will this store be different from the “Expo” experiment? That was also a “design oriented” and “female friendly” format, right? And in the case of the unit in Vernon Hills–it was in the same strip center as the Home Depot. You can literally walk from one to the other in seconds.
To reiterate my whole-hearted agreement with those above, HD should concentrate on raising the service levels in all regards and the results will come, from both male and female shoppers alike who don’t have quite as much “DI” in the “Y” as they think they do. One last footnote, over the past month or so my local HD seems to have about three times the normal staff level on the floor whenever I go in. I wonder if this is serendipity or strategy?
Home Depot’s new format sounds appealing. Maybe having more female employees offering design and decorating advice on home remodeling would be a logical extension to the concept.
However, having two different formats might be confusing to consumers unless the differences were clearly explained and have a different name to differentiate them.