The Home Depot (Atlanta) is opening 17 stores on February 7, the largest one-day store rollout in the company's history. That breaks the home improvement retailer's previous record for the most store openings in one day, set November 16, 2000, when 13 stores opened.
Home Depot's will spring up in four new markets — Indianapolis leads the way with four store openings on the same day. Florida marks its 100th store opening with its new Orlando location. The company is also adding stores in Blairsville, Ga.; Lewiston, Idaho; Fergus Falls, Minn.; Parkville, Md.; Granbury, Boerne and Katy, Texas; Avon, Ohio; Coldwater and Ludington, Mich.; Paramount, Calif.; and Pittsburgh.
“It's interesting to note that the 200 stores we will open this year is more stores than the company opened in its first 13 years,” says Mike Folio, senior vp of real estate. “The 17 new stores brings the total to 1350 stores in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and Puerto Rico.”
Over 3000 associates will be added to the company's payroll with the 17 new locations. Home Depot, the world's largest home improvement chain and third largest retailer in the U.S., expects to hire approximately 40,000 new associates this year alone.
Home Depot caters to do-it-yourselfers as well as home improvement, construction and building maintenance professionals. It is also expanding into Mexico and South America and is testing a new smaller-store format called “Home Depot Lite.”