COVID-19 Significantly Impacts Kitchen & Bath Industry

The National Kitchen & Bath Association (NKBA) and John Burns Real Estate Consulting (JBREC) released their Q1 2020 Kitchen & Bath Market Index (KBMI). Each quarter, NKBA surveys professionals in building/construction, manufacturing, design and retail sales on industry conditions, with this iteration focused largely on the effects of COVID-19. Respondents say the pandemic has an impact of 8.08 (on a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being no impact and 10 being significant impact) on their business, with retail sales (8.3) and building/construction (8.29) most affected, compared to design (7.96) and manufacturing (7.84).

Kitchen and bath professionals list economic uncertainty and fear of recession as their current primary challenges, demoting cost of materials, availability of skilled labor and labor costs — the top three concerns last quarter — to seventh, eighth and 11th on the list, respectively.