Makita is not sold at Home Depot for cordless garden tools.

When purchasing something through our links, ToolGuyd may earn a partner commission. My local Home Depot stores recently allocated a lot of floor space for cordless garden power tools, and I was surprised to see that there was no presence of Makita. Typically, Makita USA focuses on its cordless garden power tools, offering promotions both in stores and online. It's impossible to know the context of their absence on spring Black Friday at Home Depot and the promotions for garden power tools, but the effect was noticeable.

Home Depot Cordless OPE Display, Spring 2023

Last year, Home Depot had a wide variety of brands, including Milwaukee, Makita, Dewalt, and Ryobi. 2023 marked the first season I saw any kind of Makita XGT cordless tools in Home Depot stores.

Home Depot Cordless OPE Display, spring 2021

I didn't take a good picture of the 2022 display, but there were many different brands in 2021. As shown in the first image, this year's display is mostly occupied by Ryobi and Milwaukee.

• According to a local representative who showed me a pie chart on his tablet last fall, Ryobi dominates the sales of cordless garden tools at Home Depot, potentially explaining why 2/3 of their seasonal section is occupied by this brand.
• Milwaukee received approximately the same space as in previous years.
• Dewalt did not have a presence in garden tools OPE, and judging by the stock in the Home Depot online store, this applies not only to my local stores.

Makita takes pride in its OPE cordless tool technology, and this has been - or was - a market segment where Makita USA aggressively competed in the past. A year ago, Home Depot made an important announcement that they intend to ensure that "battery-powered products account for more than 85% of garden equipment sales by 2028."

So where are the Makita tools? Has Home Depot decided to focus on Ryobi, or is Makita not interested or unwilling to occupy the seasonal promotional space they held in previous years?

The North American segment of Makita has had a tough couple of years, so I think it might be that they chose not to participate rather than being pushed out by Ryobi. Sales and inventory costs can be expensive, and perhaps Makita really needs to focus on profitability right now, even at the expense of sales volume and visibility. But in any case, this is bad for end users.

Customers want OPTIONS. The needs of most Home Depot customers will be well met between options from Ryobi and MIlwaukee, but we want to see Makita there as well. The same can be said for Dewalt, but they currently have plenty of visibility in-store with promotions on cordless power tools.