Home Depot wants to improve its bottom line, whether homeowners are embracing home improvement or not.
It’s why the company paid $4.3 billion this week to win a bidding war for building products distributor GMS. The acquisition is among a series of moves that give the big box retailer a critical direct line to commercial contractors.
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Home Depot’s retail roots have historically made it a one-stop shop for homeowners tackling big home improvement projects with a do-it-yourself mentality. The problem with that strategy in 2025? Thanks to a slowdown in home sales and persistently high interest rates, practically nobody is doing DIY home improvement projects anymore. Which is why the retail player has spent the past few years seeking avenues to diversify into the typically steadier business of professional construction projects (sorry, suburban dads, but haphazardly wielding power tools and insisting “don’t worry, I’m a pro” does not actually make you one).
The push into the pro market began in earnest last year, when Home Depot dropped $18.5 billion to buy SRS Distribution, which sells supplies to roofers, landscapers and other professionals in the contracting world. The acquisition of GMS — which was completed at about a 35% premium to the company’s share price, and including debt, holds a total enterprise value of around $5.5 billion — gives it an ever deeper reach in the professional world:
Based in Tucker, Georgia, GMS operates about 320 distribution centers and sells, rents and delivers products such as drywall and steel framing directly to contractors at commercial job sites.
Home Depot is completing the acquisition through SRS, which will remain a subsidiary of the big-box retail company. Together, GMS and SRS will operate “a network of more than 1,200 locations and a fleet of more than 8,000 trucks capable of making tens of thousands of jobsite deliveries per day,” SRS CEO Dan Tinker said in a statement.
Build Your Own Business: Home Depot’s bidding-war win is billionaire Brad Jacobs’ loss. Last year, Jacobs launched a building products company, QXO, with the express purpose of creating an industry empire through mergers and acquisitions. GMS had been Jacobs’ latest target; he offered $5 billion in cash for the firm last week and threatened a hostile takeover if the bid was rejected. Home Depot ultimately topped that bid. Which means to build a bigger construction business, Jacobs may have to rely on a little less M&A and a little more DIY spirit.
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