Remember When Home Depot Refused to Do Business With…?
2nd April 2015
It was over a decade ago that purchasers representing a sometimes controversial segment of American society discovered that Home Depot had no interest in their business—in fact, it had a formal corporate policy against selling to them.
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As it turned out, the move had little to to with a principled anti-war stance and everything to do with a principled anti-red tape stance. The federal government is a pain in the ass to deal with. With regard to a memo to store managers reiterating policy, Frank Fernandez, executive vice president and general counsel noted, “Since we have never been a federally approved contractor, our intent was to re-state our existing policy for our stores and associates and remind them of their responsibilities in complying with related rules.”
A Washington Post piece on the growing kerfuffle noted, “a firm that does $50,000 worth of business in a year with the federal government automatically becomes a federal contractor and must file reams of paperwork.”