HOME IMPROVEMENT TRACKER

The most complete insights into Home Improvement
consumer trends.

The newly refreshed Numerator Home Improvement Tracker provides quarterly insight into omnichannel consumer buying behavior and promotional activity in select home improvement categories. Powered by Numerator’s panel of over 225,000 shoppers, the tracker provides a high-level view into emerging trends and category metrics for the home improvement industry.

Home Improvement Category Insights

Most focus categories are seeing declines across all key metrics so far in 2023 vs 2022, an unsurprising trend given the unprecedented boom the home improvement industry saw in 2021. Buying rate is the only metric where gains were seen, with hand tools growing slightly within this area.

Ecommerce Insights

Through Q1 2023, In-Store shopping still reigns supreme when it comes to household shopping, with triple the household penetration of Online (87.1% vs 32%). However Online trips are larger, nearly doubling the spend per trip versus In-Store.

Trip Insights: Home Ownership

Our Home Improvement Tracker trip insights have been updated to offer a unique view into home ownership status of shoppers making purchases in three select categories: Hand Tools, Outdoor Power Equipment, and Power Tools. Looking at the past 12 months, the majority of consumers making purchases in these categories are homeowners, particularly so for Outdoor Power Equipment.

Promotional Insights

Home Improvement categories of focus are seeing mixed promotional support so far this year. YTD promotions in the Cleaning Tools category are roughly on par compared to 2022, while Major Appliances and Power Tools are seeing significant increases. Hand Tools, Kitchen & Bath Fixtures, Lawn & Garden, OPE and Paint Supplies are seeing significant declines in promotions YTD.

Survey Insights

Our quarterly Home Improvement Survey dives deeper into the 'why' behind category purchases made in the past three months, and provides a look forward at intentions for future home projects. Key highlights this quarter include:

Consumers were most likely to be buying home improvement items for a small DIY project, though this varies when segmenting by category purchased— Major Appliance buyers, for example, were significantly more likely to be replacing a damaged item.
Inflation had more of an impact on buying behavior in Q1 2023 than in Q4 2022— 34% of shoppers indicated it did not influence their purchase decision in Q1, versus 43% in Q4.
Shoppers are most likely to take on Lawn/garden (63%), small painting (40%), and bathroom renovation (24%) DIY projects in the next 3 months, and their planned purchases match these intentions.