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Comment by evilduck | Hacker News Reader

Yeah, I went into a Home Depot store that wasn't my regular location a couple weeks back looking for dowel rods. Trying to speed up my trip I asked two different employees on my way to the general area of the store which specific aisle they would be on. Neither of them even knew what a dowel rod was, let alone what aisle it might be on, and obviously neither of them would be qualified to proactively try to help avoid the ones with knots or badly angled grain. It's not just that sales staff are ignorant nowadays, it's that the job itself has practically vanished.

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On that very topic, I saw a customer ask an employee manning the wood cutting station at a Home Depot if he could cut a dowel rod in half. The employee didn't know if it was possible because it was "round." I think they realized they can get away with just not training their employees.

Cutting round things in a saw can be dangerous if they aren't clamped correctly: they can spin. (Don't know of a link, this was taught to me at community college in the context of cutting round metal stock in a band saw.)

I mean, yeah? Train the staff on how to clamp correctly?

I would expect all cuts to be fully clamped in a store.

Did Home Depot ever teach their employees that kind of stuff? I always assumed they hired people with previous knowledge/experience. It's possible that there are just less people with that experience, that also want to work at a store like Home Depot.

In that specific situation there’s likely training because operating a saw can be dangerous and incurs liability, not because Home Depot wants to impart knowledge to customers.

>>Did Home Depot ever teach their employees that kind of stuff? I always assumed they hired people with previous knowledge/experience.

I think they used to hire people with industry experience - i.e. semi-retired or retired plumbers, electricians, carpenters handymen etc and that worked pretty well coming of the 2008 RE meltdown and economic mess at that time - but now any halfway qualified tradesperson can make close to or more than a six figure salary - so working at HD for $15/hr doesn't seem all that attractive anymore.

I don't even try to ask the employees any actual 'technical' questions - I am happy if they can just point me to the correct aisle to find what I need these days.

With Home Depot/Lowes the employee (or you) can look up on the item on the web site and it will show you the row/bay its located in. Dont be surprised when you see staff know even less about where things are located.

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