 | Macleods Limited was founded in 1917 by Roland M. Macleod as Macleod’s Limited, a mail order farm supply business. Macleod’s first building was a rented space on Notre Dame Avenue East in Winnipeg. In 1920 Macleod’s purchased property at 50 MacDonald Avenue in Point Douglas, Winnipeg. In 1928 Macleod’s opened a warehouse in Saskatoon and soon after added retail departments in the Winnipeg and Saskatoon warehouses. The success of these retail departments led to Macleod’s opening its first retail store in Melfort, Saskatchewan in 1930. Macleod’s opened more stores during the 1930s, expanding to become a retail chain of farm supply, hardware and building supply stores across Western Canada.
In 1945 Macleod’s was purchased by Gamble Skogmo Inc. At that time, Macleod’s had twenty-seven retail stores in Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. The company continued to operate as Macleod’s Limited, a subsidiary of Gamble-Skogmo. At the end of 1948 Macleod’s established a new dealer franchise division which granted its first franchise in April 1949 to a group of businessmen in Steinbach, Manitoba. In 1952 Macleod’s Ltd. moved into a large new warehouse and home office at 1301 Ellice Avenue, Winnipeg.
In 1964 Gamble-Skogmo consolidated its Canadian holdings creating Gamble Macleod Limited, a new subsidiary, which was headquartered in Winnipeg and oversaw four operating companies: Clark’s-Gamble of Canada, Growth Acceptance, Macleod’s Store Properties and Macleod Stedman Limited. Macleod Stedman Limited consisted of two separate divisions: Macleods and Stedmans. (Stedmans was founded as Stedman Bros. Ltd. in Ontario in 1912 and purchased by Gamble-Skogmo in 1962.)
In 1964 there were 220 Macleods stores - 77 company-owned stores and 143 franchises - from Fort William, Ontario to Prince George, BC. During the 1960s Macleods focused on opening and expanding stores to become large "family shopping centres" rather than the earlier small general merchandise stores. In 1966 Gamble Macleod Limited and the Macleods division moved into a new home office and warehouse at 1530 Gamble Place in Fort Garry, Winnipeg.
In 1980 Macleod Stedman Ltd. was purchased by an investment group led by CanWest Capital and in 1992, with its stores struggling financially, Macleod Stedman Ltd. was purchased by American-based Cotter and Company and was restructured into a dealer-owned cooperative called Cotter Canada. The Macleods stores became Tru Value stores and Stedmans became V&S. In 1999 Cotter Canada became TruServe Canada Cooperative Inc.
In 2006 TruServe converted from a cooperative to a share structure and was acquired by Rona in 2010. In 2015 Rona acquired the Canadian license for the Ace Hardware brand and TRU Hardware stores became known as Ace Hardware. In 2016 TruServ Canada became known as Ace Canada. That same year, Rona was acquired by Lowe's and in 2017 Lowe's closed Ace Canada’s Winnipeg office and distribution centre, shifting its operations to Ontario.
- Macleod's, Ltd. (1917-1964)
- Macleod-Stedman, Inc. (1964-1992)
- Cotter Canada (1992-1997)
- TruServ Corporation (1997-2006)
- True Value Company (2006-present)
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