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Beginning woodworkers usually spend a lot of time determining what tools they need to start and finding out how to use them. But I've spoken with a great deal of newbies that they are a little unprepared for their first journey to the lumber department of the blue or orange big box house center. So in this video, I wish to equip you with self-confidence and knowledge to make the experience a little less frustrating.
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Having just started dabbling in woodworking 4-5 years ago, I still remember how intimidating my first trip to a home center was. Wish I would have had your help back then!
Exactly. Loved this video, but didn’t learn much…. because it took me about 3000 times up and down the aisles to learn it.
Great video, Steve. Also might be worth mentioning that a lot of these stores have a scrap bin that they will sell excess cutoffs at a discount.
Life hack. Play dumb and ask an employee how much it costs. If they’re nice they’ll give it to you for free.
Another tip: if you’re gonna use an employees time on a panel saw, limit it to 1-2 cuts.
These big box stores work on skeleton crews.
P.S you’re the worst customer if you ask to have quarter inch plywood ripped into 4 inch strips.
I hated customers that gave a laundry list of cuts.
I don’t know about that. I was making some basement storage shelves, since looks weren’t important I used 2×4 and osb. As my shelves were all 2’ deep I had them rip the sheets in half, I know some loss to kerf, but good enough for basement shelves. If I was picking up six boards, I had them make six cuts, one per board. I don’t see the problem there. Not to mention my local big box charges for anything past four cuts, if someone is willing to pay they can get as many cuts as they want.
@Arbbal comsider this, that employee you give a laundry list of cuts to already has a laundry list of stuff from his one manager, and youre the 8th customer of the day with a laundry list. I worked both depot and lowes, I was pretty lenient with the cuts as I know the customers didnt know any better. But it was frustrating knowing that your boss would not sympathize.
@Aaron Walker That sounds like a management issue at your store then. Myself having worked both in retail and food service, and as both employee and management, I was always taught in customer service the customer is the priority. If I gave my people a list for the day and they only got halfway because of helping customers those were the breaks. Sorry to hear about your poor management, not everywhere is like that.
If at all possible, avoid the big box stores on the weekends. I find shopping in the evenings much easier if you hope to be able to dig through the boards to find ones that aren’t hockey sticks.
I just want to point out that while home depot is convenient, I always try to go to a lumber yard whenever possible. I bought home depot pine for a long time before I decided to check out my local lumber place. They had furniture grade pine for around 1/2 the price of what home depot charged for much better quality and much wider boards. When it comes to hardwood it’s even more of a difference.
Yeah, doubtful
Excellent advice. A few other things I learned the hard way. For heavy sheet good on lower shelves, pull it out, stand it up on the 4’ end, line it up with that center section, and tip it onto the cart. For any board, check for edge knots, gouges, chips, and checking/splitting on the end. I sometimes bounce it on the concrete floor and listen for anything other than a solid sound.
I love this concept, as I’ve personally had to get over the difficulty of learning this without guidance. I’d like to see more on this subject, of sourcing and buying materials like plastics, metals, more “exotic” materials like those aluminum X channel bars. I know I shouldn’t prejudge the help at some stores, but I have a lot of baggage asking for help from the comic/game shop as a kid (and I know that was probably weighted to me having only $5 allowance to spend in the early 90’s) and half the time if I couldn’t figure it out on my own, I just left the store and gave up on my project.
Cordless circular saw is a must have tool imo. I have always struggled to borrow a truck or a trailer to get sheets home. With that circular saw, I can break down the sheet to rough dimension and use my mini van with 4 car seats permanently installed to get the plywood home
Really looking forward to the wood mill video – I’m always so intimidated by those places!
Thanks for this video! I hope you do a follow-up on lumber yards because I found this one really helpful
Very good video, it is nice to see that this process is exactly the same as it is here in Australia.
We have a different and smaller range of specialty wood at our home depot (which is named Bunnings here) most of the species of wood are locally sourced.
In case if you are looking for more exotic range of timber it is required to look for and visit a specialty lumber yard or suppliers.
Another thing I wish to mention is that those are excellent tips for the beginner or a diy worrior, especially these tips :
How to get the lumber to your car, being prepared and bringing a circular saw to cut your timber pieces for easier transport home, to make sure that there is a barcode on one end of the timber so your shopping experience is much quicker and more pleasant, plus you get to go back to your project in time.
Great video!
I work in the lumber department at my local Home Depot. I wish our customers were considerate enough to put away all the lumber they make a mess of. When it comes to hardwoods, we only have red oak, maple, and poplar. I wish we had more options… Great video as always!
I worked in the lumber dept at an HD many years ago. So I understand the frustration of lumber strewn everywhere. But I have also been working on jobs/projects and had to find the two good pieces of wood in the stack of barely-fit-for-construction garbage.
OMG this is perfect 👍 sooo extremely helpful for a newbie woodworker, I love it, thank you so much 😊 I was able to make notes for my next shopping adventure 😀 I have a question about your course, is it universal? I mean I live in Australia, and we can have different materials etc over here?
Great video Steve. As a manager at Home Depot you make great points, I really like when you said be considerate and put the boards back when your done. Nothing drives me and my staff crazier then someone tearing apart a bay of wood and leaving a huge and dangerous mess. I am jealous that your store carries woods like cherry. Mine only carries oak and maple. Also really liked the way youe explained the carts and the uses. Nothing is worse then trying to put a board on a regular shopping cart.
As for the saw, sorry to hear you can’t find someone to run it ever. We to have issues with them breaking, but a lot has to due to rough handling. All in all a great video!!
Another excellent video for the new woodworker. When I first bought lumber at HD, I didn’t know that maple wood is priced per foot. Imagine my surprise when the cashier quoted me a price 3-4 times higher than what I was expecting. An expensive lesson learned. Thanks for the info Steve!
So many practical points here that I’d never have thought of, probably even after multiple trips done the hard way. Great video.
Steve,
I can’t thank you enough for this video. I commented on your community post about two weeks ago that I think was the brainchild of this video about how intimidating all this stuff can be. Keep this up, man.
I’m amazed at the selection of hardwoods you have at your store! In my Lowes and Home Depot the DFW metroplex, the only hardwoods we have are red oak and poplar, sold by the board, I think basically the stuff that trim carpenters use.
I wish you and your channel were available to give this advice when I was starting out but we didn’t have YouTube in those days. (The Romans were still here in England!) If you have a timber mill within reach, popping in there and striking up a relationship with them can pay dividends long term. Thanks Steve. As usual a great video!
I started the weekend woodworker course a year ago (which I HIGHLY recommend). I wish I had known about furring strip vs pine boards before I bought a bunch of 1x3s and 1x2s 😂. Lesson well learned.