Window Market Watch: Planning for Homeowner and Pro Purchases in 2023-2027

Due to increased new con­struc­tion and remod­el­ing activ­i­ty in recent years, the home improve­ment win­dow mar­ket has expe­ri­enced rapid growth. Based on our reg­u­lar U.S. Size of Mar­ket analy­sis, The Home Improve­ment Research Insti­tute is see­ing that the demand for win­dows is start­ing to shift.

So, what will home­own­ers and pro­fes­sion­al con­trac­tors look for when mak­ing win­dow pur­chas­es this year? Here’s what home improve­ment man­u­fac­tur­ers and retail­ers should know about cur­rent win­dow trends.

State of the Window Industry

The win­dow mar­ket has seen sub­stan­tial growth in recent years, both glob­al­ly and with­in the Unit­ed States. 

A few quick figures:

• In 2022 alone, the Unit­ed States con­sumer win­dow mar­ket grew 25.9% to a total of $7.0 billion.

• Also in 2022, the Unit­ed States pro­fes­sion­al win­dow mar­ket grew 27.1% to a total of $8.26 billion.

Among con­sumers, the win­dow mar­ket is pre­dict­ed to con­tin­ue this momen­tum through 2023, peak­ing at $7.2 bil­lion for the con­sumer mar­ket before declin­ing by 2 – 5% per year between 2024 – 2027.

Among Pro­fes­sion­al installers, 2023 through 2025 con­tin­ue to look like sol­id years for seg­ment growth, with upwards of $9 bil­lion antic­i­pat­ed each year for the pro­fes­sion­al mar­ket before cool­ing in 2026 and 2027.

For a detailed look at spe­cif­ic CAGR fore­casts in the win­dow seg­ment, down­load the lat­est U.S. Size of Mar­ket Report.

Homeowner Decisions About Windows

When it comes to dri­vers of win­dow pur­chas­es, a HIRI sur­vey of top-project pri­or­i­ties among home­own­ers shows that most prod­ucts for win­dow projects are pur­chased for a planned project.

Top Factors Driving Window Purchase Decisions

The top two rea­sons for ini­ti­at­ing a win­dow replace­ment project are stan­dard house main­te­nance or repair or for the ben­e­fit of ener­gy util­i­ty cost savings.

Here’s how those pur­chase moti­va­tions trans­late into project type:

• Planned repair/​replace: 44%

• Part of a remod­el­ing project: 18%

• Planned addi­tion: 16%

• Emer­gency repair/​replace: 14%

• Emer­gency addi­tion: 5%

Recent trends point to a gen­er­al rise in win­dow instal­la­tions for remod­el­ing projects. How­ev­er, HIRI fore­casts that this trend will reverse among con­sumers in com­ing years and instead show increased instal­la­tions by pro­fes­sion­als for repair and main­te­nance reasons.

Window Replacement Project Timing

Regard­less of the rea­son, home­own­ers report that the idea to take on a win­dow replace­ment project most often emerges between Jan­u­ary and May, with March being the most com­mon month for mak­ing the deci­sion to adopt the project.

This shows the best time to plan sales and mar­ket­ing activ­i­ties is through­out the first half of the year while project plan­ning is high but the project is not yet initiated.

Types of Windows

Wood win­dows are replaced most often, fol­lowed by aluminum.

Vinyl has long been the dom­i­nant replace­ment mate­r­i­al cho­sen for reg­u­lar win­dows, but recent years have seen an increase in com­pe­ti­tion from fiberglass.

Most popular window replacement materials are as follows:

• Vinyl: 44.2%

• Fiber­glass: 15.7%

• Wood: 15.0%

• Clad wood: 10.7%

• Alu­minum: 10.6%

Do note, how­ev­er, that a major­i­ty of shop­pers for storm win­dow replace­ments choose alu­minum (76.6%).

Window Purchase Drivers

When select­ing spe­cif­ic win­dow prod­ucts and mate­ri­als, home­own­ers list the fol­low­ing fea­tures as the most impor­tant criteria:

• Durability/​being long last­ing: 69%

• Attrac­tive appear­ance: 57%

• Price: 49%

• Sav­ing on util­i­ty costs/​consuming less ener­gy: 41%

With sus­tain­abil­i­ty top of mind for many con­sumers, HIRI expects the demand for ener­gy-effi­cient win­dows to increase in com­ing years. To remain com­pet­i­tive in the mar­ket and meet cus­tomer needs, man­u­fac­tur­ers should pri­or­i­tize the above fea­tures in their prod­uct design and mar­ket­ing com­mu­ni­ca­tions while con­sid­er­ing adding new low-main­te­nance or ener­gy-effi­cient options.

Top Window Suppliers

Tak­ing a look at home­own­er shop­ping behav­iors, home cen­ters are by far the most used sup­pli­er, with a major­i­ty of pur­chas­es hap­pen­ing in-store and online pur­chas­es con­tin­u­ing to account for over 20%. Online shop­ping for win­dows has decreased since 2020, but pur­chas­es through this chan­nel remain con­sid­er­ably high­er than in 2018.

Retailer type:

• Home cen­ter: 53%

• Spe­cial­ty store: 10%

• Discount/​department store: 10%

• Hard­ware store: 9%

• Ware­house club: 6%

• Non-store­front retail­er: 12%

Purchase method:

• Phys­i­cal store: 55%

• Online: 24%

• Pur­chase online and pick up in store: 20%

• Some oth­er way: 1%

His­tor­i­cal pur­chas­es dat­ing back to 2014 indi­cate a decrease in pop­u­lar­i­ty of discount/​department stores and an increase in shop­ping at hard­ware and spe­cial­ty stores.

Man­u­fac­tur­ers may want to recon­sid­er the mix of retail­ers that car­ry their win­dow prod­ucts in order to opti­mize expo­sure to tar­get audiences.

Influence of Professional Installers

Accord­ing to the lat­est report, win­dows are a project that home­own­ers com­mon­ly opt to install on their own if they are able.

Who performs a majority of window installs?

• Home­own­er: 40%

• Paid pro­fes­sion­al: 28%

• Shared install with anoth­er non-pro­fes­sion­al: 11%

• Spouse: 9%

• Shared install with a paid pro­fes­sion­al: 9%

In con­trast to home­own­ers, who typ­i­cal­ly install a small num­ber of win­dows (63% report pur­chas­ing just one to four win­dows at a time), paid pro­fes­sion­als are often hired to do more full-scale replacements.

Addi­tion­al­ly, Pros hold more influ­ence in win­dow replace­ment mate­ri­als deci­sions than oth­er home improve­ment prod­ucts, car­ry­ing an influ­en­tial say in 38% of design based win­dow selec­tion deci­sions and 47% of func­tion­al­i­ty based win­dow selec­tion decisions.

Looking Ahead

As for whether win­dow prices will need to con­tin­ue to be adjust­ed in 2023 and 2024, that will depends on fluc­tu­at­ing demand. Cur­rent high­er inter­est rates on home loans may pre­vent home­own­ers from replac­ing their win­dows unless for a repair and main­te­nance reasons.

Because demand for Pros for repair and replace­ment projects remains high, eval­u­ate how your chan­nel part­ner pric­ing mod­els can keep demand strong and increase your mar­ket share.

The U.S. win­dow mar­ket will con­tin­ue to see growth in 2023, dri­ven large­ly by repair and replace­ment needs and incen­tives being pushed for ener­gy-effi­cient win­dow mate­ri­als to be installed.

Need to stay up to date on the mar­ket forces impact­ing the win­dow seg­ment and oth­er home improve­ment prod­uct seg­ments? Join HIRI as a mem­ber for instant access to new research.