Home Depot problem is costing customers a fortune
Christy Rakoczy
Sun, December 7, 2025 at 8:37 PM EST
3 min read
For many people, holiday planning starts early in the year as the catalogs come in and they begin making plans for what they will be buying during the festive season.
Unfortunately, for fans of Home Depot, their plans are now up in the air because of a major problem at the store.
The issue is causing some customers to end up spending a fortune to fix the situation, as many turn to online forums and groups to express their concern and look for solutions.
Here’s why Home Depot customers are struggling, along with some details about the potential cause of the problem this festive season.
Home Depot customers hit with holiday disappointment
The problem at Home Depot comes from the absence of oversized holiday decorations.
The store released a catalog earlier this year with its giant yard decorations that Yahoo Life reports have developed a cult following.
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Customers began creating their shopping lists, including 30-year-old Landon Richard of Louisiana, who told the Wall Street Journal that he’d decided on an 8 ½ foot reindeer, a red and gold sleigh, and an oversized Santa after a leak in March showing that Home Depot’s holiday offerings would include these items.
Unfortunately, when Richard and other fans of Home Depot’s holiday gear hit the stores in August and September, when the decorations usually become available, the items were nowhere to be found – and they still have not materialized even to this day.
Store employees confirm the issue
Store employees have addressed the shortage of these items in online forums, including in one Reddit post where a Home Depot worker said he had been getting multiple weekly calls about a large decoration featuring Santa in a sleigh being pulled by Reindeer.
Others chimed in, saying their store had received only a small number of the large Christmas decorations and that they had sold out very quickly. “Our store finished setting up on Thursday, by Saturday evening they were all gone,” a poster commented.
Customers express their dismay online about the Home Depot problem
Customers have not been quiet about the missing decorations. In fact, a Home Depot Halloween and Christmas Facebook Group with over 165,800 members has been abuzz with discussions about where the items are and why they can’t be found in stores across the country.
Some have speculated that tariffs are to blame for the absence of the giant decor, as some of the larger decorations are imported from Chinese companies that may not be able to move the items affordably into the United States.
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However, the holiday decor merchant told the Wall Street Journal that the tariffs “would not be the sole reason as to why we would change our assortment and strategy.”
The merchant also confirmed that customers are correct that many products are missing, though, indicating that not all of the items seen in the leaked catalog will be available this season
Customers are spending a lot of money because of this Home Depot problem
Regardless of the underlying reason for the problem, it is a costly one for consumers as they are forced to turn to the secondary market in order to get their holiday fix. ‘
Yahoo reported that some of the most in-demand items are being resold online for prices exceeding $1,000.
Customers who can’t afford those prices are also crowdsourcing their efforts to find the limited available stock. Yahoo reported on one 44-year-old collector who found an 8-foot Santa that was five hours from his home. He put down a $300 deposit to hold the item before driving to get it.
Unfortunately, with the Christmas season well underway, it is unlikely this problem is going to be fixed at this point. Customers may simply be stuck paying inflated resale prices or giving up on their dream of holiday decorations this year.
This story was originally published by TheStreet on Dec 7, 2025, where it first appeared in the Retail section. Add TheStreet as a Preferred Source by clicking here.
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