Lowe's Canada celebrates the opening of the 100th Ace Dealer store in Canada

Boucherville, QC – April 25, 2018 — Lowe’s Canada, one of Canada’s leading home improvement company operating or servicing more than 630 stores in Canada under the Lowe’s, RONA, Réno-Dépôt, Dick’s Lumber, Contractor First and Ace banners, is proud to welcome its 100th Ace dealer store: Owen Sound Ace Country & Garden located at 1320 2nd Avenue East in Owen Sound, Ontario. Owned by the Huron Bay Co-operative, this latest addition to the network marks an important milestone for Ace Canada, which has seen unpreceded growth over the past year, nearly doubling the number of dealers proudly displaying the banner.

“Lowe’s Canada is committed to growing the Ace network in Canada by enhancing services to dealer owners and supporting their sales and profitability. The fast and steady growth we have witnessed over the past year is a direct result of that commitment and the solutions we implemented to support our affiliated dealers,” explained Antonio Cioffi, Executive Vice-President, Finance (GFO), Affiliated Dealers & Real Estate.

“We are thrilled to welcome our 100th Ace store and to witness such a great response from dealers toward the Ace banner throughout the country,” said Bill Morrison, Divisional Vice President for Ace Canada. “Canadian hardware dealers appreciate the Ace value proposition and outstanding customer service approach and they know that with a strong partner like Lowe’s Canada supporting them, they are set for success.”

To support affiliate dealers and provide them with the tools they need to succeed, Lowe’s Canada carried out several value-driven initiatives over the past two years. These included the integration of the Ace distribution and business centres into existing Lowe’s Canada facilities in February 2017, which allowed the company to offer Ace dealers lower prices, better support, and an enhanced product offering to better meet their customers’ needs. Lowe’s Canada also launched the Ace Canada transactional website in the fall of 2017 as part of its omnichannel strategy. This new platform provides Ace customers with a fast and easy “click & collect” service for all dealer locations in the country. With this service, Ace dealers can offer an even wider product selection to their customers, without putting added pressure on their inventory costs and storage capacity. “This truly is an exciting time to be joining the banner,” added Bill Morrison. “Ace Canada is thriving and we expect to keep growing the banner as more dealers continue to join our family and seize this opportunity to be part of something bigger.”

To mark this milestone, Ace Canada will host a celebration at the Owen Sound Ace Country & Garden store from Thursday, June 21 to Saturday, June 23, 2018. The local community will be invited to come in store to take advantage of amazing deals and take part in special activities. To celebrate the opening of the 100th store across its entire network, Ace Canada will also be hosting, on Saturday, June 23, 2018, an online-only nationwide promotion on acecanada.ca.

About Ace Canada For more than 90 years, Ace Hardware has been known as the helpful place in thousands of neighborhoods globally, providing customers with a more personal kind of helpful. With more than 5,000 hardware stores locally owned and operated around the globe, Ace is the largest retailer-owned hardware cooperative in the world. In Canada, RONA inc., a wholly owned Lowe’s subsidiary, has the master license agreement for the Ace brand. Ace Canada is proud to be part of Lowe’s Canadian businesses, which together operate or service more than 630 corporate and independent affiliate dealer stores in a number of complementary formats under different banners. For more information on Ace in Canada, visit acecanada.ca.

About Lowe's Canada
Lowe’s Companies, Inc. (NYSE: LOW) is a FORTUNE® 50 home improvement company serving more than 18 million customers a week in the United States, Canada and Mexico. With fiscal year 2017 sales of $68.6 billion, Lowe’s and its related businesses operate or service more than 2,390 home improvement and hardware stores and employ over 310,000 people. Based in Boucherville, Quebec, Lowe’s Canadian business, together with its wholly owned subsidiary, RONA inc., operates or services more than 630 corporate and independent affiliate dealer stores in a number of complementary formats under different banners. These include Lowe’s, RONA, Réno-Dépôt, Dick’s Lumber, Contractor First, and Ace. In Canada, the companies have more than 28,000 employees, in addition to nearly 5,000 employees in the stores of RONA’s independent affiliate dealers.