Home Depot plans mid-year launch of Internet
sales
ORLANDO, Fla., March 1 (Reuters) - Home Depot will begin selling its
do-it-yourself goods and appliances over the Internet by mid-year, a
company executive said Monday.
Kim Shreckengost, director of investor relations, said most of Home
Depot's full line of products will become available on-line, but the company plans a slow roll out so it will have
time to learn about its cyber-customers and to guard against hurting store sales.
The electronic commerce should be most effective in selling ''power tools and branded products that customers
already know they want when they walk in the store,'' Shreckengost told institutional investors at a conference
sponsored by Raymond James & Associates.
''Its a little hard to sell lumber over the Internet,'' Shreckengost said.
Home Depot officials said they were coming off ''a great year'' in 1998, when sales rose 26 percent to $30.2 billion,
and were ready to expand a subsidiary store that performed well.
Bryant Scott, president of the EXPO Design Centers, said his division will add seven new design centers to the
eight already in operation. Three of the stores will be in Los Angeles, Dallas and Atlanta.
Scott said the company plans to open more than 200 EXPO stores over the next 5-7 years.
The company also plans to open three Villagers Hardware stores in New Jersey in 1999, officials said. Smaller than
the traditional Home Depot warehouse-style outlets, the Villager's Hardware stores will offer a narrower range of
goods.
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