Home Hardware Stores Ltd. Optimizes Prices Across Thousands of Stores and Locations with Wiser

Background

The Canadian home improvement market, valued at $52 billion, is both expansive and fiercely competitive. For Home Hardware Stores Ltd. - Canada’s largest dealer-owned hardware, lumber, and building materials retailer - maintaining competitive pricing across a network of thousands of independently owned stores was critical to sustaining customer loyalty and market leadership. However, managing consistent and competitive pricing across such a diverse network posed significant challenges. To respond swiftly to market shifts and evolving consumer expectations, Home Hardware needed a data-driven solution capable of effectively monitoring competitor prices and dynamically optimizing their own.

Challenge

Home Hardware needed to maintain competitive pricing across a geographically diverse network of stores. However, their existing price-monitoring processes lacked the agility to capture and respond to market changes in real time. Home Hardware faced the following challenges:

• Limited Competitor Visibility:
  The lack of comprehensive, real-time insights into competitor pricing made it difficult for Home Hardware to identify market trends and pricing gaps across their diverse regions and store types.
• Slow Monitoring and Price Adjustments:
  Existing processes were too slow to collect, analyze, and act on pricing data, making it challenging to respond dynamically to market fluctuations and competitor activities.
• Lack of Scalability and Flexibility:
  Managing pricing for a large, diverse product catalog across hundreds of stores was complex and inefficient, particularly given the need to account for regional differences. Home Hardware required price recommendations that were region-specific, incorporating localized market dynamics and competitor pricing. Achieving this level of precision while maintaining consistency across the network and respecting the autonomy of their dealer-owned stores demanded a highly customized solution.

Solution

Home Hardware Stores Ltd. implemented Wiser Price Optimization to gain the data and insights needed to stay competitive. Wiser provided:

• Real-Time Monitoring and Automated Repricing:
  With Wiser, Home Hardware doubled the frequency of data collection, providing real-time insights into market changes. Automated repricing based on multi-channel inputs allowed them to swiftly adjust prices to match competitor movements and meet evolving consumer needs—all without manual intervention.
• Safeguards for Confident Decision-Making:
  Wiser’s Live Preview & Simulation feature allowed Home Hardware to simulate different pricing strategies and preview potential outcomes before implementation. This eliminated guesswork, ensuring pricing adjustments were made confidently and strategically.
• Scalable and Unified Pricing Coverage:
  Wiser delivered a scalable and regionally tailored solution, enabling Home Hardware to monitor prices across 1,000+ stores with both a unified and flexible approach to competitive pricing. Recognizing the importance of regional specificity, a Wiser Subject Matter Expert built a dedicated Price Optimization instance for each location. This ensured that pricing recommendations aligned with localized market conditions and competitors’ prices while maintaining consistency across the network.

“As a company, we went into this process knowing our end goals and had an idea as to how to get there but having Wiser there to provide feedback and a different perspective helped focus our efforts.”

Leanne Morton

Price & Cost Analyst

Results

By leveraging Wiser’s Price Optimization, Home Hardware achieved:

• Enhanced Operational Efficiency:
  Doubling the frequency of monitoring gave Home Hardware the agility to respond swiftly to competitor moves and market trends. Wiser’s customizable prioritization features allowed them to focus on key product categories, regions, or competitive benchmarks, ensuring efficient and targeted price adjustments.
• Boosted Competitiveness:
  With a precise understanding of competitor pricing across diverse regions, Home Hardware could identify pricing trends in both rural and urban markets. This ensured their pricing strategies stayed aligned with market dynamics, keeping them consistently ahead of the competition.
• Actionable Insights:
  Price recommendations based on comprehensive data analysis helped Home Hardware balance competitiveness and profitability. These insights empowered store owners to make informed pricing decisions aligned with market conditions and business goals.

Conclusion

With Wiser’s Price Optimization Solution, Home Hardware Stores Ltd. transformed its pricing strategy, ensuring it remains competitive and agile in a challenging market. By harnessing data-driven insights and improving their monitoring capabilities, Home Hardware can confidently meet customer expectations and stay ahead of the competition.