I much prefer to buy locally whenever possible to keep the $$ in my community and to be able to easily return any damaged or irregular products.

When it came to purchasing wall and floor tiles for 2 new bathrooms, I first decided on the tiles I wanted to use, then priced them on the internet from icfloors.com and fastfloors.com plus shipping costs. I brought the comparative price info to the local tile store, which then priced the tiles competitively. Some were a wee bit higher and some were priced a little lower. With no shipping costs, I think it was the best solution for me.

We bought a very basic 6x6 white wall tile for under $2 at a local tile place. Also picked up a faux carrara marble 12x12 for around the same price. It was a kids bath and neither of us wanted to spend big $$ on tile as we went to the ceiling with tile in the bath and ~50" up all walls. Best part was we got real advice from knowledgable people (good luck with that at the big orange box).

Generally, I'm under the impression that the basic wall and floor tiles at HD are the same quality as everyplace else. I think you could run into problems and quality differences if you were looking at natural stone.

I have used tile that was purchased from HD.

Never noticed a problem with it.

Mongo

If you find a cheaper source for Villeroy and Bach, either on line or in a showroom, jump on it, because it won't last very long. You've got a better shot at hitting lotto. :-)

The only things I'd add to Mongo's post about tile at HD is that you want stay away from the Marrazzi tiles. They're notorious for terrible sizing. Other than that, you should be fine with what you find at HD. If you see something you like, just make sure it has a PEI (glaze hardness) rating suitable for what you want to use it (if it's a glazed tile, of course!).

Hi Mirad,
I'll add to Mongo and Bill's observations with some of my own. Home Despot and B-Lowes get their tiles from reputable manufacturers (Dal Tile & American Olean, for the most part). These are the same manufacturers which supply much of the building market through other distribution. Good product with a good catalog.
What the home center stores do that the rest of the industry doesn't "benefit" from is that they are able to pressure the manufacturers, using their huge buying leverage, to give them the product at a lower price-point, which then makes the tile cheaper to the home center customers.
The margin on tile manufacturing is already very thin and there are only a few means by which the tile companies can reduce the cost to the home centers AND still remain profiable. One method is to use inferior materials in the production. But this requires separate supply chains and facilities and in the end would prove to be too costly unless an entire facility was dedicated to just that retailer. This has been done with some product but it's not effective with all tile because the purity of the materials can dramatically alter the properties of the tile.
The next step toward cost reduction is reducing the amounts of materials being used in production. This is most often employed when the glazes are applied by thinning the glaze and firing at lower temperatures or for shorter periods of time. This results in a less durable tile, but it's effective for white/off-white wall tiles and that is mostly where you will find this being done.
The next cost cutting step is reducing the amount of human interaction that the tile encounters. Since modern facilities are already pretty automated, the bulk of human interaction with the product occurs during packaging and quality control. Here's where the home centers get their price point demands met. Most often, when the tile comes out of the kiln and comes down the conveyor, it is diverted to quality control personnel who visually inspect it for imperfections, damage, and impurities. In the case of the home center discounted tile, if the manufacturer eliminates this step entirely (and the home centers are VERY aware that this happens) then they can ship the product at the lower price point and everybody makes their 30 pieces of silver while the home owner is pulling their hair out over mis-sized, pocked, cracked and spotty tile.
Never ever purchase an open case of tile at the home centers. These have already been rooted through or might even be someone else's nightmare returned to the store. Always buy more than you think you will need and inspect every tile as you install it. Look at the corners for chipping and the glazed edges for puckering. Also, when selecting the tile, hold up a few tiles sideways to the light. Do you see faint scratches? Can you see the bisque of the tile underneath? Do the tiles look flat or are they cupped or otherwise warped?
Remember that the home centers are not interested in selling you quality. They are only interested in price-point and getting you the cheapest possible price. The rest is up to you.
What sort of tile are you considering that Home Despot and Villeroy & Boch on both being considered? Where are you located so that other suppliers might be suggested?
Caveat Emptor,
Shaughnn

Thank you for such a detailed response. I am in NJ, near the clifton/wayne area. I guess it sounds like it may be worth getting tile at a large retailer, but only if I really look through it and not the whites. I am doing 3 bathrooms, so I am looking at all sorts of thongs. I tend to like a classic look, textured or marbelized, in neutral colors- with some accent. For two bathrooms I definately don't want shiny, but for the kids bathroom I was considering white base shiny tiles, with some striped colored accent pieces, of which Villeroy and Boch have very cute possibilities.

I hear what you're saying about the quality control issues but I paid $1.60/sf for american olean subway tile at Lowes. My tile shop has them for $3.79/sf and doesn't take returns, whereas Lowes will happily take back the extras if I end up with too many. I would be examining my tiles before putting them up on the wall anyway but the one box I opened, I haven't noticed any issues with glazing or pitting or anything like that on any of the tiles. Maybe it's because it's a relatively simple tile with a simple glaze and nothing fancy - I don't know. I have a pretty good eye (I'm an architect) so I don't think it's just that I can't see the difference. The tiles purchased from Lowes look exactly the same as the samples sent to my office direct from AO (and one would HOPE that they have decent quality control for their samples).

I AM buying my trim pieces at my local tile shop - $2.79 per piece for the basic white chair rail when it's $3.98 at lowes. The black is the same price, $2.79 each. The lesson in that is not to always assume that it's cheaper at a big box but actually shop around.

Hi KGWLISA,
It's ironic that you bring up the AO tile from Lowes, as that's one of the examples I was thinking of when I wrote the response above. AO makes that tile *exclusively* for Lowes. It exactly mimics AO's other material in dimension and color but the materials are inferior and the glaze is so watered down and applied so thinly that it's easily recognizable to most tile setters. I learned this when a designer made a huge production about supplying the tile to a remodel I was putting together and she showed up with these bozes of AO tile. At initial inspection, I didn't notice anything out of the ordinary but as I fixed them to the wall under a skylight the quality became immediately noticeable. I got on the telephone to AO immediately and questioned them about their quality control and their professional commitment to quality. And that's when much of the above was explained to me by the local AO manager. It's their bottom-quality product and they refuse to sell it through their normal distribution channels. But Dal Tile at Home Despot isn't innocent either. Dal Tile owns American Olean Tile and work in the same business model.
Shaughnn

Well I brought one of our office samples home to compare it to my lowes sample and honestly, I could not see a difference. The tile is the same thickness. Held at an angle in the sun they had the same number of minute "bubbles" in the glaze (very few but I can't say that it was mirror smooth on either) and the actual base ceramic of the tile is exactly the same color - so I can't speak as to whether they use inferior materials to make the Lowes tile but if they did, they spent some serious time making it look exactly like their regular tile. The glaze looks the same thickness and opacity to me. Honestly I can't see a difference between the two tiles and if I mixed them up and they weren't marked there's no way I'd be able to tell them apart.

Honestly, I think the difference in price comes from the big box stores' ability to buy in quantities that far exceed any other tile reseller for their stores nationwide. Also I believe that Bill has stated that his contractor price for subway tile is not too far off what you can get it in Lowes/HD for - unless AO/Daltile has also come up with a super secret recipe to make tile that looks identical to their regular line but is inferior to sell to contractors as well.

I guess as with everything YMMV, buy at your own risk etcetc - but I have a pretty discerning eye and they look good to me and I've never heard any complaints from anyone who has used this tile - tile setter or homeowner alike - on this site or anywhere else until today. Maybe you just got a bad batch and AO was trying to cover their butt by saying that the big box stores WANT it to be that way. Who knows?

Hi again KGWlisa,
I'm not saying that the tile is complete garbage. But I am saying that the product one buys from a home center is not always going to be of the same caliber as the product bought through a local distributor. I'm simply sharing my knowledge of the tile industry which I've gained through nearly 20 years of installing tile and being such a tile geek that I talk shop with retailers, manufacturers, installers, people at bus stations, my cat, etc.
The bisques are the same, though the firing times and temperatures are reduced where allowable to reduce the cost. The glazes are the same, but because they are thinned down and their kiln time is also adjusted, it is less durable and also less uniform. The boxes which the tiles are shipped in will be the same from facility to facility, though the quality of cardboard is different when US and Mexican production runs are stacked side-by-side. And then there's the human element. It's really simple manufacturing economics and while the home centers do get a discount for their massive bulk buying, the margin is already very slim so the manufacturers can't shave THAT much off the cost and remain profitable. And so quality suffers.
I can't comment on the quality of nails, or paint or plumbing fixtures at the home centers because I haven't had the kinds of conversations with their manufacturers like I have with tile. If you are in Orlando, Florida next April, why not join me at the Coverings Tile & Stone trade show and we can tour the booths together? I'll introduce you to a few people. :)
Shaughnn