"You Killed Us.": Home Depot Stock (NYSE:HD) Slides as Story of First Ad Emerges

Home improvement giant Home Depot (HD) has long known the value of good advertising. But as it turns out, this is a lesson learned over a lot of years, and sometimes, the hard way. Even Home Depot's first ad ever did not go according to plan. This news, apparently a story that made the rounds back in the late 1970s, recently got a broader stage to shine on. But investors were less than pleased, and Home Depot slid modestly in Monday morning's trading.Claim 70% Off TipRanks This Holiday SeasonUnlock hedge fund-level data and powerful investing tools for smarter, sharper decisions Stay ahead of the market with the latest news and analysis and maximize your portfolio's potential Home Depot started operations on June 22, 1979. In advance of that opening day, they bought an ad in the Atlanta Journal, and a second in the Atlanta Constitution. The ad promoted their new store in the area. For the time, it was a strange idea: a huge warehouse, open to the public, with thousands of products. In an unexpected twist, the purchased ads never actually showed up in either paper. Furious, terrified, and with a stack of bills from vendors to payroll eating them alive, Home Depot's founders called the papers, saying, "You killed us. We are trying to get this company off the ground and you single-handedly put us out of business." The papers made up for it, however, and gave Home Depot "…prime advertising space…for weeks…" to make up for the error. Another Theft Ring Broken Meanwhile, reports emerged of another major theft operation broken up by police, though this one, reports suggest, was a one-man show. Jordan Morrell was recently taken into custody on suspicion of stealing power tools from multiple Arizona Home Depot locations and reselling them online. Home Depot's corporate loss prevention team spotted the thefts back on December 7, and got together with police to supply information to help track Morrell down. Police then got a warrant to track Morrell's online activity and made the connection between what was allegedly stolen and what was for sale via Morrell's operation. Is Home Depot a Good Long-Term Buy? Turning to Wall Street, analysts have a Moderate Buy consensus rating on HD stock based on 17 Buys, five Holds and one Sell assigned in the past three months, as indicated by the graphic below. After a 12.7% loss in its share price over the past year, the average HD price target of $401.95 per share implies 16.24% upside potential.