Fencing – Home Depot installation? [Archive]

LOL, well speaking from a installer standpoint that does the millwork installs work our HD I can tell you how our store works. BTW, I get plenty of work on my own (been growing the past 3 yrs since I started this business and never been under 6 figures in gross anual sales)and for no more than what HD pays, it’s strictly a marketing ploy on my part as it gets me exposure to the public I would normally never meet since I do no advertising except yellow pages which are a joke. More often than not I get calls back from these customers for future work.

The way it works with millwork, there is HD-Middle man-contractor. HD sells the job or bids it, they fax the paper work to the middle man who intern faxes it to me and I go out and measure the job, make material list for what will be needed. I go back to my office, put together a estimate from an already pre-determined price sheet agreed upon by HD/Middle man(company)/and myself for labor we will perform. I fax that to the middle man, they intern add their amount they want to make on the job which I have to assume is already pre-determined also, and they fax it back to HD. They inturn put together the complete material list and add that to the price of the windows/doors the customers were inquiring about. Customer is then called and given the estimate. If the job sells then the customer pays up front before anything begins.

What HD uses for contractors could vary by region, I’m required to carry a set amount of liablilty insurnace and homeowners are required to be there when the work is being performed. We also do garage door opener installs and sheds, since often this type of work is outside of the home, homeowners are given the option to be there or not. Either way, once the work is completed we have a lein waiver from HD that the homeowner must sign saying the work was completed and it meets their expectations-so their signing off. I have had a few call backs from garage door openers that we installed would not open/close fully after being installed for some time and all of those were just a matter of increasing the open/close force when the weather got extremely cold-??dont ask why since that’s the $10,000 question:) When the customer calls HD with a problem, HD calls the middle man, they inturn call me and I make it a point to remedy the problem same day for my sake as well as the customers and that way everybody stays happy.

I had this account last year and dropped it after some shaddy stuff going on with the middle company, but HD called me and said they had a different company and wondered if I’d be interested in taking over installs again. This new company is very flexible allowing me to take alot more control over contacting customers and setting schedules since I know what we have planned, used to be the middle company would try to dictate what I did and when I did it, I cant run my main business that way-and there were other issues. But this new configureation is working out just fine for everybody so I hope it stays this way.

From my experiences HD will stand behind the work (which boils down to the contractor standing behind the work since our trucks and crew were onsite and I dont want a bad repour so I can get work in the future and hopfully they’ll think of me when they do) WE truely want the customer to be happy. HD themselves dont tack on fluff money since they are making their money off the product. Either way if you go through HD or hire an outside contractor hopefully everything will go smoothly and you will be happy with your decsion.

Sorry for the long rant, but often we assume alot of things we “think” we know so I’m just offering “how it really works”;)

Josh

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