Home Depot/ Lowes Service Providers?

coinggrazy

Hi has anyone been a Service provider for either of these two companies? If so what was your experiance? Or how about service providing for home Warranty companies? Is that any better?

Thanks mel

KBN

Applied Months Ago For Service Provider For Home Depot & Lowes. Never Got Any Response. Seems As Though Every Small Contractor & Their Dog (dallas Area) Are Service Providers.
Hard To Get In With Them.

mdshunk

That might not be the type of work you should go after. The big box stores, as well as most warranty companies tell you what they pay for the job, rather than you telling them what you charge.

I do a little work for a couple of warranty companies, because they send a work order by fax, which includes a "do not exceed" amount. I can deal with that. I can't deal with a flat 40 bucks to hang a paddle fan for Home Depot.

I'm not sure how I originally got work from these home warranty providers. Many of them just send letters every once in a while, or call, to see if you're [generally] interested in working for them. Another similar type of work is national maintenance service providers who provide maintenance for naional retailers. These are usually done on a DNE (do not exceed) basis too.

Steer clear of flat fee stuff if you can help it.

I would think that in a major market, such as you are in, if you didn't get in "on the ground floor", you probably missed your chance. I'm sure that if you were persistant, you could start getting work from them, but I'm just not sure that this is the work that you should be so desperately seeking. On a related note, I have seen some of Sear's recently revamped pay schedules, and it seems to be getting more attractive to sub labor for windows and siding for Sears.

BreyerConstruct

I know this is an older topic, but I'd be interested to see some new thoughts.

We're interested in both boxes for decks & paver installs.

I don't know if it will pan out, and truly, I'm not sure what to expect. All I do know, is that I need some more consistent work, and HD & Lowes have the $$ to sink into getting interested people in their respective doors, and I need that.

Let me hear your thoughts guys. )

~Matt

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firemike

I had considered becoming a contractor for Home Depot or Lowe's until I found out the specifics of what was involved. All the hoops you have to jump through and the low profit just wasn't worth it, at least in my trade of remodeling.

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Putty Truck

I might be interested in national maintenance service providers. Any names/contacts?

KillerToiletSpider

They usually go through the local BBB and then call the city hall in the town for a referral, at least that was the SOP 8 years ago when I still did service work. It's not bad work, and the service providers are realistic about what it costs to do things.

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TRG

I own TRG Environmental Services and we are a service provider for the Home Depot Home Services division for North & South Lakeland stores, Lake Wales, Sebring, and Winter Haven. These stores are located in Central Florida.

The contracts you sign with the Home Depot are actually with their State wide main service contractor. The price for each project is determined by "you" the contractor not the Home Depot or the main service provider. However your price must include a 25% user fee on each project you bid. If you a complete a project under the Home Depot flag they get 25% of te contract price and then you receive the balance. The down side is that even if you lose money on the project the Home Depot still gets its 25%.

Good Luck,

fenceauthority

Hi! At The Fence Authority we're the expert fence installers for their At Home Service Providers program in the DelMarVa peninsula. We've had a great experience so far, and would encourage others to look into the program as well.

If you have more questions, feel free to contact me via my website at fenceauthority.net.
Thanks!

Stone Mountain

We became authorized Home Depot Service Providers in April. Never again!
We had the following things to do, or worry about:
1] We had to give them $1000 as a "security deposit"
2] you are supposed to pay for police and background checks. That cost another $450.00
3] You are supposed to pay for shirts, hats, signage on your turcks, etc. We didn't bother, and I guess they forgot.
4] You pay for every lead: $3.40.
-If the store "associate" spends more than 3 minutes with the customer there's an additional $5.00 charge. This of course leads to an unqualified lead and lots of tire kickers. Just totally wastes our time.
-If the lead goes into "fallback" (you don't talk to the lead and reposrt back via computer within 48 hours) there's an additional $3 charge
-You pay for EVERY lead, even if it's duplicate, or not your trade.
5] You are not supposed to take any money from the homeowner. IF you DO take a deposit, it goes directly to Home Depot. You are expected to finance the entire job and then wait to get the money.
6] Home Depot supplies the lumber through its own supplier. That way you don't have to pay for the lumber: only labour.
Unfortunately, the supplier does not supply concrete, nails, screws, hardware, cedar, composite, or anything at all except pressure treated. On the last job of $15,000, only the fence material was supplied. I had to supply all the other material. It was finished 2 weeks ago, and I can't even bill it becuase the homeowner, who is away, hasn't signed the completion. I'll see this money around Christmas, I suppose.
7] There's a HELLOVA lot of paperwork. For 3 months my wife did virtually nothing but call HD leads and follow up on the computer.
8] out of 600+ leads, 90% were time wasters. The store assoicates didn't bother to qualify ANYBODY, and if they did, we had to pay extra(see above).
We were getting calls like this" I (the customer) bought 2 panels of prefab fence and 2 posts. They said you'd install it for me, so I need a free, on site estimate" Yeah, right. I'm going to drive 30 miles one way to give you an estimate for a $100 job that we wouldn't even do.
9] They are LOUSY payers. The paperwork to fill out to get paid is confusing and difficult. It's often sent back to us for "correction" without bothering to tell us what's wrong. More than once, there's been an addition error which could be corrected by them in 30 seconds. Instead, the paperwork gets sent back and we're expected to redo it completely. The local contact is unhelpful and hostile (I've actually known her for 26 years through the actual company she works for), and it's taken as long as 6 weeks to get paid.
10] According to the contract, they don't even offer an extra warranty. The onus is entirely on us.
11] They take 17% on top of our price. For fencing in the Toronto market that puts us completely out of the ballpark. I have even had clients act totally surprised that we weren't cheaper" Isn't Home Depot Bigger? Can't you get deals?" As a result, our closing ratio on HD customers is 30% of what our regular leads are.
12[ There is Home Depot, then their management company "Centa", then their local management company, and then us. To get any problem solved, there are 3 companies to deal with.
I cancelled my agreement 6 weeks ago out of frustration. apparently it is going to take 3-4 months to get my $1000 back.

Lowes, on the other hand, pays me for each estimate, supplies ALL material, and pays within a week.

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Brock

We worked for both Lowes/Home Depot.

Slow paying but it was like printing money. Both stores switched to a flat rate for kitchen cabinet installs and we had to quit them. Their flat rate was less than half our standard fee.

But if you can wait on your money, it's not a bad gig. Tons of work.

mike stanislaw

Hi Matt, I believe in that US ARMY slogan, "BE ALL YOU CAN BE" its hard to do that when you are not dealing with a free enterprise system like capitalism. All HD and Lowes are trying to do is the same thing Big companies did at the turn of the century. This practice only brought about the birth of unions and the min. wage of which both are freaking useless today.
my approach to these two big companies if i even wanted to deal with them would be lets take your expertise Matt pavers and decks. Hey Mr. Home Depot I'll increase your sales of pavers and deck materials if you advertise Me as your vendor for a brand new home improvement idea. Wood Framed decks using pavers as the decking. See Matt Hd are big companies. big companies do not invest in creativity. they like it if it falls into they laps for free. make them pay for your creative ideas or you will take it to Lowe's and Hd will catch up in maybe a year or two. You have leverage Matt US IT.

ExpoProvider

We are a GC working with The Expo Design Center... a Home Depot Company. Yes there are TONS of hoops to jump through and you must keep jumping through them.

In this ecomony it helps.. its usually consistent work and okay on the pay. As they always try to keep cost down, it doesnt always happen.. they do try to dictate price, just have to know how to work thier system.

Is it for everyone? NO. You must play by thier rules or they will kick you out of the sandbox. Its not bad... not the best.. but hey.

PMI

Home Depot closing its EXPO business

I guess it is not an issue anymore http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/26/news/companies/Home_depot/index.htm
Sorry it didn’t work out for you, but definitely a good effort on your part.
Phil

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bwalley

I looked into it years ago and decided against it, I also know a granite company that installed granite for an impossible to please client, HD siad the customer did not have to pay for it since they were not happy and expected the sub who built, installed and supplied the granite to eat a $7500 job.

stay away from whore depot a loweslife.

what irritates the crap out of me is HD sells trane equipment and lowes sells carrier, so i won't sell trane or carrier.

gibsonman02

you are not missing the headaches that comes with working for home depot,they always mess something up and are slow to pay

cbscreative

Hey, gibson, since that was your first post, welcome. Just be aware that this thread was started in Aug 2006.

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