Path to Pro trains people for a 400,000-job skilled-trades gap and connects them to hiring pros. This concept adds the layer that turns a trained worker into a paid one an owner can trust: a funded, proof-verified, on-chain-settled work packet, hazard-gated, closed with photo+GPS+signature, settled to a permanent receipt. Training to job to proof to pay.
www.homedepot.com/ returns HTTP 403 "Access Denied" (AkamaiGHost) to a normal browser request (home, product, and category alike) while robots.txt (the file that tells search engines what to index, 200) invites crawlers. The world's largest home-improvement catalog is a wall to any non-JS agent.corporate.homedepot.com/ is reachable (200) but ships zero structured data (the invisible labels search engines and AIs read); pathtopro.com/llms.txt returns the 1.1 MB app shell: a client-rendered SPA agents read as empty.llms.txt (the file AI assistants read first), no ai.txt, no .well-known/agent-card.json (the file that lets an AI assistant use a site correctly) anywhere across www / corporate / pathtopro: all true 404s.Baseline credited first (the retail engineering is world-class). Then four evidenced findings (the Akamai wall, the machine-illegible Path to Pro surface, the missing agent front door, and the outcome gap between training and paid work) each with the exact URL, HTTP status, and re-check command.
Read the briefTwo acts in Home Depot's own palette: Act 1: a graduate finishes free training and asks "now what?" Act 2: that person claims a funded Build-ladder work packet (Living Building Challenge housing work, materials shop-at-THD-shaped), closes it with photo+GPS+signature proof, and settles to an on-chain receipt that becomes a verified track record.
Run the demoConcept files: an llms.txt that makes Path to Pro, Pro Xtra, and product data discoverable, an agent card, MCP tool schemas for bill-of-materials and verified-work lookups, and a concierge persona. Drafts, ready to hand to Home Depot's own team.
construction_site_safety_walk and building_audit lanes; proof-checked packets (photo+GPS+signature); on-chain settlement on Base: EWP contract 0x76c17C…A14B, first settled packet workId 14; agent-payable tools over x402 (a standard that lets an AI agent pay per API call automatically: work-packet $0.10 · work-proof-check $0.01); and a live end-to-end agent walkthrough: the building-agent golden path.
work-packet program answers HTTP 402 with a standard x402 payment schema; the agent signs a USDC authorization and pays $0.10. A runnable client with a dry-run default is published at vealth.net/recipes.html.Why this isn't scary: the agent cannot do anything invisible here. Every action embeds its own receipt: permanent, public, verifiable. That is more accountability than most enterprise software offers, not less.
The bet: AI competence is scaling, and Home Depot has already bet on it, shipping Magic Apron (a generative-AI assistant live on the app and millions of product pages) and Sidekick for store associates. Being early to the proof-verified work layer costs $0.10 and one afternoon. Being late just means the verified track records of the tradespeople you trained accrue nowhere: the graduates carry a certificate, not a portable, provable work history.
work-packet x402 call today; the receipt lands in seconds. Inbound-only, no outreach. [email protected].
