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“Christmas trees give us so much joy,” the Lee Valley Tools video on social media says. “And then we give them to the chipper.”

The Ottawa-based specialty retailer wants to change that, so it has launched a social media campaign under the brand’s “Let’s Do Something” mantra. Lee Valley says it wants to “inspire Canadians to embrace crafting and woodworking by creating ‘look what I made moments’ out of their old Christmas trees.”

Participants are encouraged to email Lee Valley photos of their projects or post them under the hashtag #LVSecondLife. The contest runs until Feb. 1, 2024, and winners will receive a $100 gift card.

Ace Hardware, of Oak Brook, Illinois, placed first in the home improvement category in Forbes magazine’s 2024 customer service rankings, released earlier this week.

Three thousand companies were evaluated by Forbes, who surveyed 201,000 people in the U.S. who provided 4.2 million ratings. Survey participants were asked to rate brands on online and in-store customer service, consisting of “people, speed, services, and resolution.” Ace was the 33^rd company on the list. In the U.S., Ace has a heavily-promoted Service Guarantee, in which Ace will deliver for free any item on a shopper’s project list that is out of stock (the customer has to agree to pre-purchase the item).

Just what bricks-and-mortar dealers wanted—another extremely wealthy and ubiquitous online competitor. Bloomberg, the business news service, reported yesterday that TikTok, the Chinese social media behemoth, is aiming for a tenfold increase in its U.S. e-commerce business in 2024.

Bloomberg, though the numbers were immediately denied by TikTok, claimed that TikTok Shopping is aiming at US$17.5 billion in merchandise volume this year.

Even at that huge revenue, TikTok would remain a minnow in comparison to Amazon’s almost US$600-billion in revenues. However, TikTok has an obsessive following among Generation Z consumers, who are just entering the workforce.

Industry executive search leader Wolf Gugler is the go-to for both hiring and inquiring about new opportunities. His latest Hardlines Classified spells out the array of services his firm supplies, all with a specialization serving manufacturers and retailers in the North American home improvement industry.

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The Greater Toronto and Vancouver areas posted significant decreases in home sales in 2023. The regions are the largest housing markets in the country, but were impacted by high borrowing rates. The Toronto Regional Real Estate Board’s latest data shows some 66,000 home sales for the year, down 12 percent from the previous year. In Metro Vancouver, sales fell by 10.3 percent to 26,000.

Throwback Thursday is a weekly feature in which we dip into the archives of the Hardlines Weekly Report.

In our Jan. 5, 2004, issue of our weekly Hardlines newsletter we ran a story with the headline: “Canada Gets First Urban Home Depot.”

In the story, we reported that Annette Verschuren, then-president of Home Depot’s Canadian division, expressed disappointment that Home Depot’s bid for the Maple Leaf Gardens site in Toronto had fallen short—and a Loblaw’s Superstore had been chosen instead. Still, she looked forward to the opening later in 2004 of Canada’s first Home Depot urban store, in Vancouver. Another site for an urban store, we reported, had been secured in Calgary. Home Depot had pioneered its urban footprint concept in New York City in 2003.

Home Hardware Stores Ltd. will roll out a new Scotiabank Home Hardware Pro Visa Business Card for its contractor clientele later this month. As a result, it will conclude its existing Top Notch Rewards program at the end of June. Scotiabank will announce more details about the new program on Jan. 31. Home Hardware has been partnered with Scotiabank through the financial institution’s Scene+ program since last summer.

Randle Jones died in Coquitlam, B.C., on Dec. 19 at the age of 89. He founded Windsor Building Supplies in 1969, Jones grew that first Windsor store in Surrey, B.C., into a 52-store chain in Canada—plus four stores in Washington state and one in Montana. He was predeceased in 2017 by his loving wife and business partner, Fran, after 60 years of marriage.

After studying business at the University of British Columbia, Jones got a job at Stewart & Hudson Lumber Co. in his hometown of Victoria in 1952. He later bought the company before coming up with the idea for Windsor Building Supplies, which he grew mostly on the franchise model.

Windsor is known for specialty wood products and also sells lumber, hardware, doors, floors and mouldings. He and Fran founded the Windsor Plywood Foundation many years ago, with projects chosen by the individual stores. It has given tens of millions of dollars to worthy causes in B.C. and western Canada.

“This is very sad news for the Jones family and all the industry people involved with the Windsor Plywood group of companies,” said Thomas Foreman, president of the BSIA of B.C. “Randy was a great leader and mentor to many in our industry and will be dearly missed by all.” Jones is survived by three children and numerous grandchildren.

Business owners who took out loans under the Canada Emergency Business Account are feeling the stress of looming deadlines, CBC News reports. Businesses that pay the majority of their balance by Jan. 18 can be forgiven up to $20,000. They also have the option of refinancing at higher interest rates.

“Do we take a loan out or do we just empty the bank account?” said Rod Castro, owner of two Ottawa restaurants. “That’s the juggling act right now.” Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, called it “outrageous” that the rules around refinancing were only clarified in early December, just weeks before the coming deadline.