Why People Aren’t Spending As Much Time In Home Depot As They Once Did

New data from SafeGraph shows the steep and recent decline in how much foot traffic there is at Home Depot. The store tends to be more popular in the spring and summer months, gradually peaking and declining throughout the seasons. In the summer of 2020, however, Home Depot experienced record-breaking peaks, with 1.4 million total in-person shopping visits in June alone. Yet, recent numbers are significantly lower; Home Depot had less than 1 million in-person visits last June, and this June just 600,000.

The lack of in-person shopping isn’t correlated with the store’s sales, though. Insider reported in February of this year that Home Depot made over $40 billion in sales since 2020, which is more than nine years of growth when looking at the company’s previous earnings. According to NPR, the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in lots of people seeking out home improvement projects to work on while stuck inside, which is reflected in the major spike of in-person visits in 2020.

What it doesn’t account for, though, is why people aren’t shopping as much in person anymore despite Home Depot’s continued financial growth. As it turns out, this shift likely has a lot to do with the popularity of online shopping. Internet purchases are responsible for 14.1% of global purchases, with that number expected to rise to 22% in 2023, per OptinMonster. With online shopping being safer, more affordable, and easier, in-store visits are falling to the wayside, especially at Home Depot.