Reply #17: You know if it wasn't for Home Depot, there would be price gouging [View All]

[jmowreader]

Bernie Marcus, one of the founders of Home Depot, singlehandedly ended the building-products industry's longstanding practice of price gouging after natural disasters.

The day after Hurricane Andrew hit, Bernie went to his computer and got a complete list of vendors servicing The Home Depot. He then picked up his telephone and called each one, informing them that he knew exactly what every item we sell cost two weeks before the hurricane and that if any item we purchased during that time was billed to us at a higher price, after the disaster was over we would never again do business with that vendor.

Then he instituted a policy that freezes prices in the stores at what they were two weeks before the disaster.

Then he put up big banners informing the public that our prices were the same as they were before the hurricane hit.

This had the desired ripple effect--no one at the retail level wanted to try to price-gouge, not with the knowledge that the biggest vendor has announced that they aren't doing it.

A couple of vendors tried ol' Bernie out. We have not done business with them since.

And this, my DU friends, is why Joe Homeowner in Metairie isn't going to pay $32 a sheet for 7/16" OSB.

Actually, what Nardelli is doing is in line with one of our core principles, Take Care of our Own. In a couple of days, the alert will go out to all the stores to send a handful of associates to the disaster area. We will work (and camp out on the floor in the main lumber aisle, to free up relief services for those who need it) so that our fellow associates can get their lives back together. A handful doesn't sound like much--each store is generally asked to send five good associates--but when you've got 1800 stores and there are maybe 25 Home Depots in the disaster area (there are nine in Louisiana and nine in Mississippi), we'll have plenty. We'll probably have enough to send associates out to help with the cleanup. If they ask for volunteers, I'm going.