Blue, Orange, Red, or Green? What is your favorite DIY store?

The smaller towns here have them and YES they are outrageously priced. Literally 100%+ markup compared to
HD.

 

Yup, high prices here too. They are combined with a lumber yard and I will do my best to not buy lumber form them also.

They will have some good sales from time to time. Seems I bought a lot of craftsman tool kits from them about 15 years ago.

 

Their advantage is that they ARE there, in many small towns.

 

Lowes
7 time 7 time
Go jimmy

 

Honestly, I go to the store that has the cheapest price for the item I might want.

For example, HD has a snow blower for for $579, but my gut said no due to the brand. Lowes has one that I trust (Troy Bilt) for $599. A locally owned Hardware/LumberYard has the same Troy Bilt on sale for $700. Now if I were going to go new which do you think I would purchase? Both HD and Lows are about 35 to 40 miles away, the local store is 10 miles away. Yep, I would go to Lowes. (but being the cheap azz that I am, I looked on Craig's List and found a bigger almost new snow blower 9hp/29" and ultimately paid $440)

The same applies for all of my other needs. I'll purchase a few select pieces of lumber from the locally owned Hardware/LumberYard and then check the pricing of both HD and Lowes online. Small orders, I'll go local, but if I need quite a bit, then I'll end up going to the city (HD and Lowes) for what I need. I'll also watch for certain sales for landscaping needs. The landscape timbers often times go on sale 2x in the spring. Sometimes for as low as $1.99 each. Regular price $4.27. Locally they are $4.99 always. If I only need a few, I'll go local. If I need say 50, which I do, I'll wait for the sale. The quality in all three stores are the same, but HD and Lowes have a wider selection.

Locally, the Hardware/LumberYard periodically sends out sale fliers. More often than not at least 50% of the items on sale match either HD or Lowes regular price. The rest is usually more. I'm not talking off brands, I'm talking items like DeWalt, Makita, Rigid, Englander aka Summers Heat and more. Even then, between HD and Lowes, sometimes the price difference is great. Today the price for a 13-NCH wood stove is $519 at HD and Summers heat 50SNC-13 (same stove as HD) at Lowes for $759. I purchased mine with the, blower, heat shields and brass trim that wasn't even a year old, for $200 from Craig's List a few years back cuz I'm really a cheap azz.

If I lived up Nort (north) I'd be a regular at Menards. I've had the opportunity to sample them in my travels, and I like what I saw in both quality and price. There are none even close to this area.

 

yes, Ace is expensive, but the question was what's your favorite store. If I'm close to broke, I'll hit HD, but I won't like it.

 

Lowes first, best for selection of appliances, and way better overall for military discounts. Lowes is nearer than HD. Service, about equal if you go at the right time of day, week and see the reg. person assigned to that dept.

 

I like the Military Discounts as well as Discounts for the Elderly. There are some stores that will combine the two. I have asked!

 

If I was going to buy a snowblower I would go to a local dealer who could service it after the sale. I'd probably get a Honda.

 

Home Depot and Lowes are three and four miles away respectively so can choose either and often do. Easier to order something online and pick it up at the service desk at HD. Lowes I gotta go thru a yuge congested intersection. Like wait three or four light cycles sometimes.
Ace and True Value are both a bit of a ride. My local Ace at one time was also a Husqvarna dealer but the Ace store itself has been bought out and the Husqvarna dealer got fed up with HD/Lowes cozy deals with Husqvarna and was hawking blue Husqvarna stuff so he could pick and choose servicing HD and Lowes stuff. Don't really know the whole story. I wouldn't doubt the rep's is different. No Menards in New England.

 

Not trying to sound sexist but I feel that Lowes is geared more towards women.

Home Depot and Lowe's are the local choices for me. HD wins because it's not even a mile away.

I'm gonna edit and add that I think lowes is geared more towards women and homeowners.

 

Maybe that is why it works for me - I am a homeowner, and I like women!

 

I've never noticed much of a difference between how Lowe's and HD are geared, but I'd have agreed with you if you said Menards was set up for women. Normally if I bring my wife with me to Lowes or HD she groans and keeps asking "are you done yet, can we leave!". But when I took her to Menards to get a new showerhead I was the one asking if she was done yet. It was like going to Target with her; she spend 2 hours in the store, filled up a cart with crap and turned a $40 trip into a $300 one!