Kitchen Sink: Changes to Kitchen Remodeling During the Past Couple of Years

Size Matters

Whether clients are budget-conscious because they have to be or because they think they should spend more carefully, projects have been scaled back in scope — physically and in terms of products. “I don’t see people doing the ‘let me show off to my girlfriends’ as much,” Hugo says. “Frivolous is out and functional is in.”

In general, clients are talking about their homes as long-term investments rather than as things they can parlay into something bigger, better, or fancier. “We find consumers saying, ‘Forget that throwaway thing,’” Klein says. And, says Burrill, people are doing more cooking and entertaining at home. “They seem more family-centered than they have in the past two years.”

In terms of design, Airoom has responded to clients’ needs for additional space at a lower cost by designing more contemporary — “more horizontal” — kitchens. Klein is seeing lighter colors in paint and cabinet choices; kitchens with clean lines; cabinet doors flush to the walls; fewer furniture-like pieces and more deep base-cabinet drawers; and lots of large windows. “There are still traditional pieces here and there,” he says, “an armoire in the kitchen or a refrigerator-freezer combo hidden in something that is furniture-like against the more contemporary look.”

Despite budget issues, clients want to fill their homes with quality products. For example, Hugo says she is still using granite for countertops but is helping clients choose level-one instead of level-four stone. In other words, there is more value-engineering taking place.

It has become more important to be sensitive to clients’ budgets, to “fit the consumer more correctly,” as Klein says. A few years ago, the budget could always be nudged upward. “Now you really have to think about the available funds and what clients need to do and what their hot-buttons are. What can they live without and what can they be happy with? We weren’t doing a lot of living-without three or four years ago.”

Airoom, which has two showrooms, carries three lines of cabinetry: high-end Poggenpohl, Burton Allen, and the midprice Crystal. It recently added the private-label Vantage line, a lower price-point cabinet. “People are cutting back on the type of cabinetry that goes into mudrooms, guest rooms, laundry rooms,” Klein says. In kitchens, fewer people are asking for custom.

Appliances, too, are undergoing heavy price scrutiny. The Internet has made it easy for consumers to check prices and question markup. It’s up to the remodeler to talk about this issue up-front. And, if customers want to buy their own appliances, you need a plan in place.

Airoom directs the client’s purchase, and if the company installs the product, the consumer gets an installation warranty. When clients suggest doing work on their own, Klein says that the company educates consumers about what that really means. “One service call can put them upside down,” he points out. Remodelers have to help clients “make good choices.”

When buying products, Burrill has noticed that people are more concerned about product performance than they were a few years ago. “If they can get the same performance in lower-priced materials [they’ll buy that], whereas before they were very name-focused.”

Vendors have responded to lowered budget expectations by holding price increases on cabinets, for example, and offering custom finishes at lower or no upcharge. Remodelers have been able to benefit as manufacturers offer dealers more tools — showroom support, collateral material, lead generation, and financing. For instance, dealers can now offer rebate packages on high-end lines, such as Wolf or Sub-Zero, which they hadn’t before. “These packages look good to people,” Hugo says, and most remodelers are passing on the savings to their clients.

Balancing Act

It seems that there is, as they say in the housing industry, “a correction” happening in the remodeling market. Consumers are strapped, and everyone from manufacturers to dealers to remodelers is responding in their own way. Eventually things will settle. Most industry experts agree that the industry won’t return to the 2005 high-point of more than $300 billion, at least not anytime soon, but still the market this spring is already showing signs of new life.

The one thing that remodelers can’t do is allow themselves to get caught and not be able to provide the service they are known for. No matter how many “deals” you give clients, no matter how much you discount, you still have to be able to do the work — and profit enough to live another day, another year or 10.

“It’s a balance,” Klein says. “The consumer wants to be a good shopper but also wants service and quality work and a warranty. To deliver service, you can’t cut everyone [on staff] out of the picture. At some point, manufacturers can’t make it for any less, subs and crews can’t work for any less, and you can’t provide service for less.”

—Stacey Freed, senior editor, REMODELING.