I'll take a left turn here.
Ace, in my experience, is the one that sucks the most. Partly, because the stores are franchised/independently owned. As a result, most of them are only slightly more organized than a teenager's bedroom. The one in my neighborhood (nearest hardware store) is terrible. I usually cannot find an employee and I've spent a lot of time pacing up and down aisles looking for things. Because for some reason, bolts are hidden behind plywood, but nuts are over behind the plumbing on the other side of the store.
And it's not just that store. In my experience finding a well organized Ace is a rarity.
I usually do Home Depot, though I tend to prefer Lowe's because it is cleaner and tends to attract a higher quality clientele. HD is the next closest to me after Ace.
Menards would be my preference over all of them, except the nearest one is a nearly an hour away. While the nearest HD is 15 minutes.
