Retail brands continue to find ways to focus on projects, initiatives, and causes that tie in with their communities while providing a focus for the philanthropic efforts of both customers and staff.

Take RONA inc. The giant home improvement retailer has recently redefined the mission of its charitable arm, the RONA Foundation. In the past, the foundation had worked to raise funds to contribute to the improvement of the lives of children and their families around the world–especially those living with disease, in poverty, or with disabilities.

Now, the foundation is continuing in a similar vein, but bringing the objectives closer to home. Its new mission is to improve the quality of life of Canadians in need by revitalizing their living environments or making it easier to access housing. In particular, the RONA Foundation aims to help victims of domestic violence and their children, low-income families, and people with disabilities or mental health issues.

The RONA Foundation plays “an essential role in the vision we have for the future of RONA,” says Catherine Laporte, vice-president of marketing at RONA. “Housing is a basic need for individuals and families. We decided to focus our philanthropic efforts on this cause because we believe that by helping people in need to have access to a safe home and a healthy living environment, we can improve their quality of life and offer them a better future,” she adds. Given RONA’s role in the construction and home improvement sector, “It’s a natural choice for us to opt for this mission, which is perfectly aligned with our business operations.”

At The Home Depot Canada, doing good is also an important part of the corporate identity. The Home Depot Canada Foundation, through its Orange Door Project, is committed to battling youth homelessness. It provides funds to organizations working with youth at risk of—or experiencing—homelessness. By 2030, the company intends to have invested $125 million toward this cause.

Recently, Home Depot Canada launched a new summer hat, the sales of which are going to the foundation’s TradeWorx program. TradeWorx offers at-risk youth access to resources and training for a career in the trades.

But a good cause is part of the DNA of most retailers. At Home Hardware, dealer-owners worked with Tree Canada over the past 30 years to plant more than 30,000 trees in communities across the country. That’s in addition to the many causes the retailer takes up both nationally and at the store level.

Timberkids Charitable Foundation gives TIMBER MART dealers a platform to help give back to their local communities. Every year, TIMBER MART members from across Canada make numerous donations to help their local children’s charities and Timberkids matches them. It’s an investment, the company says, in improving the lives of children and the well-being of future generations of Canadians.

Hudson’s Bay Co. has a deep history in Canada, including with Indigenous peoples. So the recent alignment of its Hudson’s Bay Foundation with NIB Trust Fund (NIBTF) makes sense. The fund focuses on the challenges faced by First Nations communities. As part of this partnership, the Hudson’s Bay Foundation has committed $1.2 million to NIBTF over three years to address the impacts of the Indian Residential School system and support Indigenous communities, working toward further reconciliation.

Examples will abound in this industry alone of retailers doing good. At a local level, most stores find ways to give back to their communities and their customers in their own way. These efforts become a way to rally the community, inspire staff, and provide a balance of commerce and caring for store owners.

Cologne Hardware Fair is a compelling draw for Canadians. So why don’t they go?

Eisenwarenmesse - International Hardware Fair, is returning to Cologne, Germany, in 2024. The biennial event will be held from March 3 to 6, 2024, and it has already experienced strong response from the hardware industry, as major companies from Germany and 45 countries around the world have so far confirmed their participation at the world’s largest hardware show, with confidence among exhibitors returning after many took a pause in 2022.

But only a handful of them will be from Canada.

“The high demand confirms the importance of the Eisenwarenmesse – International Hardware Fair as the most important global platform for the presentation of new products, services, and technologies, as well as for maintaining business relationships from the hardware segment,” said Matthias Becker, the show’s director. “We are very optimistic that we will achieve the planned exhibition area of 165,000 square metres [1.8 million square feet] in a total of six exhibition halls.”

Hardlines has attended this show for decades. We are always amazed, and somewhat confounded, by the lack of North American, and especially Canadian, participants. The show has proved an effective springboard for many Canadian vendors to reach foreign markets (not just the U.S.!). While the major retailers send the occasional team, regional retailers and the buying groups consistently overlook this show—at their peril. We encourage Canadians to consider this as part of their search for new products or customers.

This year, dealers and suppliers alike have even more reason to consider Germany next spring. Hardlines, with the Building Supply Industry Association of B.C., has organized a Rhine cruise from Cologne to Amsterdam aboard the Avalon Passion. It departs Cologne on March 6 and arrives in Amsterdam on March 13. (Contact Thomas Foreman, president of the BSIA of B.C., as soon as possible to guarantee your spot.)

Besides the new products on the show floor, the International Hardware Fair continues to build its range of educational services and workshops to make for a more rounded experience. “DIY Boulevard” provides a showcase for dozens of companies to present their products in an environment resembling the checkout setup in stores. Seminars historically have provided platforms for some of the newest ideas and leading retail trends. And networking opportunities can connect delegates with some of Europe’s top DIY retailers.

(For more information on next year’s show, click here.)

We sneak a peak at Home Depot Canada’s latest stylings for the Christmas season

Home Depot Canada held a product preview recently to showcase its assortments and design trends for the Christmas holiday season. Home Depot is growing this category and working on building awareness among its customers that it’s a destination for more than tools and building materials.

The retailer will launch its Christmas collection in the first week of October, as its Halloween push starts to wind down. The majority of the holiday seasonal assortment will be available online only, so Home Depot’s intention is to drive customers to its website as well as to its stores.

While repair and reno projects ensure strong sales through the first half of the year, seasonal sales shore up its business in the second half of the year. “Christmas is very important for us. Christmas and Halloween both drive traffic into our stores,” says Konstance Sevastos (shown here), divisional product merchant for the Christmas and Halloween categories.

She talks about how easy it is to get customers into the store during the first half of the year: spring and early summer are important home improvement times for consumers and contractors alike. But getting people to think of Home Depot as a destination for décor, especially seasonal items and accessories with real design elements, is a newer proposition.

“The back half of the year is different; these products bring people into stores in the back half.” She says people readily consider Home Depot as a destination for products like power tools and lumber. “But we’re trying to get customers the knowledge that we have other collections.”

“People don’t realize it’s all available from Home Depot,” says Cindy Jardim, who oversees trend and design for the retailer. “It’s not what people expect from us.”

EDRA/GHIN, the combined global trade body for home improvement retailers, has launched a collaborative taskforce to help the sector reduce its greenhouse gas emissions.

The initiative specifically targets “Scope 3” emissions, which address the lifecycle impact of retailers’ products on the environment. Factors involved range from the efficiency of the retailers’ supply chains right through to how their customers use—and dispose of—the products they buy for their homes.

The following leading home improvement retailers from across the world have agreed to act as the founder members of the taskforce: Adeo (Europe, South America, South Africa); Bunnings (Australia & New Zealand); Cainz (Japan); The Home Depot (North America); Hornbach (Europe); Kesko (Scandinavia); Kingfisher plc (UK & Europe); OBI (Europe); and Sodimac (South America).

For retailers, Scope 3 greenhouse gas emissions make up more than 90 percent of their overall emissions. Given the scale of their impact, they are the most important, but also the most difficult to address, as they fall outside of retailers’ direct operational control.

A range of methods is used to measure and report on companies’ Scope 3 carbon footprints. This causes confusion and inefficiencies for retailers trying to lower their emissions across their value chains and creates an additional burden on their suppliers.

The EDRA/GHIN Scope 3 taskforce will aim to address this challenge by finding a common ground for consistent methodologies in how carbon data is treated through the supply chain. Best practices can be developed in both the reporting but also the acceleration of the home improvement industry’s efforts to reduce Scope 3 emissions. These learnings will also be shared with a wider learning group for all EDRA/GHIN members to benefit from.

In related news, The Home Depot has announced its intention to cut emissions in its outdoor power equipment lines. The retailer expects that by the end of 2028, more than 85 percent of its sales in both Canada and the U.S. of push lawn mowers and handheld outdoor equipment will run on rechargeable battery technology instead of gas. The company anticipates that this transition will reduce over 2,000,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases annually from the exhaust of residential lawn equipment.

“Climate change is a threat none of us can afford to ignore,” said John Herbert, general secretary of EDRA/GHIN. “For home improvement retailers, this is a positive move where we can help them find ways to come together to address one of the fundamental environmental issues for our planet, while developing their business.”

EDRA/GHIN represents 224 retail companies in 78 countries, and the initiative is seen as an important way to unite the industry around this issue. The program was announced at the recent Global DIY-Summit, held earlier this month in Berlin.

(Any home improvement retailer that would like more information and to join GHIN, the global network, please contact info@edra-ghin.org.)

Dale Elliott has departed from his role as CEO at BSH Home Appliances (Canada). Elliott spent 16 years there. His career includes stints with National Hardware, Dremel, Emerson Electric, and Philips.

DID YOU KNOW...?

…that the Q4 edition of our sister publication, Hardlines Home Improvement Quarterly, will feature a special showcase for new products? HHIQ is a traditional print magazine that is mailed to 11,000 dealers and managers across Canada. If you have up to three new products (print-quality photos and maximum 100-word descriptions), please contact our Editor, Steve Payne by July 21. This is a free service—so tell your marketing manager about this and take advantage of the free exposure you’ll get to the entire dealer community!

RETAILER NEWS

A boa constrictor was found in a shrub last week at a Canadian Tire garden centre. Officials at the store in Richmond Square, Calgary, said the non-venomous snake was spotted by an employee. Store employee Jen Bishop, who is knowledgeable about snakes, the Calgary Herald reports, made a makeshift home for the snake where it could warm up until a proper home can be found for it.

Canac is investing $200 million in its expansion efforts over the next five years, including the opening of two new stores per year. This fall, it will open a fulfilment centre opposite Quebec City, on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River.

A man has been arrested after allegedly stealing a forklift from a Lowe’s store in Waldorf, Md., driving it to a nearby Home Depot parking lot, and fatally running down a woman there. The 20-year-old man faces an array of charges that include first- and second-degree murder. The deceased was 73 years old.

One of the most unusual charity events in the home improvement industry was held this past weekend. The Canadian Tire Welland Floatfest saw more than 1,800 people take to the Welland Recreational Canal in flotation devices. The popular annual event is in support of local charities and food banks. Canadian Tire has an almost 90-year history in Welland, Ont., and established its credit card division, Canadian Tire Acceptance (now Canadian Tire Financial Services), in the city in 1961.

As loyalty programs become a more and more integral part of retailers’ strategies, some customers who are non-members of these programs are complaining of a double standard at supermarket checkouts. “Those who follow the system get one price and those who don’t have the skills for the system get another,” retired civil servant Hélène Manuri told TVA Nouvelles, citing older and less tech-savvy customers in particular.

Affiliated Distributors has added The Baron Group, a U.S. co-operative buying group serving independent groundwater systems distributors, into its network. The deal brings independent distributors with almost 100 locations, including one Canadian member, Winnipeg’s Baker Manufacturing, into AD’s pipe, valves, and fittings division.

SUPPLIER NEWS

The past month has seen a spike in lumber prices, partly driven by uncertainty stemming from wildfires in Canada. At the same time, strong U.S. housing starts have driven up demand. Cash prices are up 22 percent from where they were on June 1. Last week, they reached US$420 per 1,000 board feet of Western spruce, pine, and fir (SPF) two-by-fours, according to a report by Fastmarkets. That was up from $343 on June 1 but 74 percent below May 2021’s record high of $1,630.