Lowe’s Requires Big Hammer

Suppliers to Lowe’s will have homework this summer, as the national home improvement retailer is requiring all of its vendors to enroll in the Big Hammer Hardlines Marketing Data Pool Program. Lowe’s has teamed up with Big Hammer Data, a company acquired last year by Nashville-based Edgenet, to collect marketing content for online, in-store and print collateral.

“This gives [Lowe’s] the data they need to do multichannel commerce,” Ravi Bagal, vice president of retail markets for Edgenet, told Home Channel News. “It will point customers to all products and options with all the data available, including photos, marketing attributes and supporting digital documents, for in-home, online and in-store selling.”

Lowe’s sent a letter to its suppliers dated March 16 to make the announcement, which has a deadline of between May and July, depending on the product category. “In order to achieve our mutual objective of more product sales in more channels, we must have your support,” the letter said. “This is a required effort for doing business with Lowe’s and we have initiated an aggressive schedule that moves swiftly through each merchandising division.”

Suppliers will be expected to provide product attributes, marketing copy and standard images for the electronic data pool.