Ace Hardware class action alleges price fixing, antitrust violations

Ace Hardware class action overview:

• Who: Plaintiff Sean Twomey filed a class action lawsuit against Ace Hardware Corp., Ace Retail Holdings LLC, Ace Retail Group Inc. and Epicor Software Corp.
• Why: Twomey alleges the company violated federal antitrust laws by conspiring to fix prices and reduce choice for consumers.
• Where: The Ace Hardware class action lawsuit was filed in Illinois federal court.

A new class action lawsuit alleges Ace Hardware conspired to fix prices and reduce consumer choice in violation of federal antitrust laws.

Plaintiff Sean Twomey filed the class action complaint against Ace Hardware, Ace Retail Holdings, Ace Retail Group and Epicor Software on May 7 in Illinois federal court.

Ace Hardware is a buyers’ cooperative owned by independent Ace hardware stores.

According to the class action lawsuit, for more than a decade, Ace stores have used their cooperative to conspire to raise prices and reduce choice for millions of consumers in violation of United States antitrust laws, Twomey alleges.

They have done so by converting the cooperative into a sophisticated tool for fixing prices and dividing territory in local markets, the lawsuit claims.

The class action lawsuit alleges Ace hardware stores collect and share staggering amounts of competitively sensitive data regarding prices and sales in their stores, which is then used to coordinate local prices and divide local markets, the lawsuit alleges.

At the core of these allegations is Epicor Software, Ace’s longtime software provider, which is accused of helping to collect and distribute sales and pricing information to “coordinate price movements and avoid [stores] competing with one another.”

The admitted goal of these agreements is to “boost margins and present a more consistent pricing image to consumers,” the Ace hardware class action says.

Class action: Ace Hardware organized stores into illegal ‘price zones’

Twomey alleges Ace has shifted from helping independent hardware stores compete and lower costs into a cartel that illegally coordinates pricing and limits competition, resulting in higher prices for consumers.

Ace Hardware allegedly organizes Ace member stores into locally defined geographic “price zones” and, working with Epicor, directs the stores in each price zone to uniformly increase prices for specified items, ensuring that prices at Ace member stores move in unison with prices at their nearby competitors.

In short, through their jointly owned cooperative, Ace member stores have agreed to develop and implement a shared set of prices that move in tandem with the prices of nearby member stores, ensuring that the stores do not compete on price, the class action lawsuit says.

Twomey wants to represent anyone in the United States who purchased directly from an Ace Hardware store or acehardware.com between May 7, 2022, and the present.

He is suing for violations of federal antitrust laws and is seeking certification of the Ace Hardware class action, damages, fees, costs and a jury trial.

In other antitrust litigations, Disney is facing allegations it uses its ownership of ESPN to monopolize the market for streaming live pay television by suppressing competition.

What do you think of the allegations made in this Ace Hardware class action lawsuit? Let us know in the comments.

The plaintiff is represented by David Walchak and Stephen M. Tillery of Korein Tillery LLC and Steven F. Molo, Eric A. Posner, Matthew E. Gold and Zakary M. Kadish of MoloLamken LLP.

The Ace Hardware class action lawsuit is Twomey v. Ace Hardware Corp., et al., Case No. 1:26-cv-05320, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division.

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