Hardware Retailing The Industry's Source for Insights and Information
The Ace Hardware 2025 Spring Convention just wrapped up in San Antonio, Texas, welcoming over 11,200 attendees—including 4,073 Ace retailers and a record 564 Emery-Jensen retailers—who browsed the sold-out show floor and engaged with the 5,020 vendors sharing their products and services.
During the general session, Ace president and CEO John Venhuizen painted a cautionary tale, pointing to the number of retail giants going out of business and what Ace Hardware can do to prevent a similar ending.
“I think the difference resides in the manner in which we have been interwoven together and how we combine global scale and strength with local ownership and autonomy,” Venhuizen says. “Ace Hardware seeks to offer you the structure of a strong framework to give you products, services and operating methods, while at the same time, affording you the freedom to shape your business for your community to serve your customers.”
Hear more from Venhuizen on the company’s focus and strategy in 2025 and beyond in an exclusive Q&A with Hardware Retailing.
Hardware Retailing (HR): What are the top three focuses for Ace in 2025?
John Venhuizen (JV): First is Elevate3 Ace, our new, cutting-edge retail concept. Elevate and its experiential, immersive brand shops represent, in our opinion, the future of retailing.
Second is Pinnacle performance—stores that achieve Pinnacle status have outperformed their peers every single year since the score has been kept. Their 8-year comp-store sales CAGR is an incredible 5.9%.
Finally, digital transformation will be upfront. Our digital business is up 450% since the beginning of 2020 and the growth continues to be double digit. Our retailers have nicely integrated their physical assets with our digital assets to become faster than Amazon on stuff we stock.
HR: What do you see are some of the biggest obstacles to growth in 2025 for independent home improvement retailers? How is Ace helping their retailers address those challenges?
JV: Tariffs are the issue our retailers are most concerned with. Thankfully, we have a very seasoned and skillful merchandising team who has a solid plan to increase our sourcing within countries that are mostly immune from tariff targets, swat away cost increases wherever possible to insulate our retailers from cost changes and protect our retailers’ gross margins.
HR: Have Ace retailers raised any concerns with the sale of True Value to Do it Best? How have you addressed those concerns?
JV: No. Our retailers are mostly quite pleased with the opportunity it has afforded Ace and the discipline with which we are managing those opportunities with both Ace and Emery Jensen Distribution.
