Post Covid-19 K&B Consumer Confidence Survey

For Part Two of our Five Part Plan to support the KBB industry during the Covid crisis, we partnered with Andrew Davies at Taylist Media to run a major consumer confidence survey for KBBreview

The survey questioned 1000+ ABC1 homeowners about their kitchen and bathroom projects and their confidence in completing these projects in light of the Covid-19 lockdown restrictions.

Listen to the podcast to hear the headline results or read on …

Overall, the results of the research proved extremely encouraging for the industry, with homeowners indicating that they were keen to carry on with the kitchen and bathroom projects they had planned before the lockdown.

The results of the @kbbreview Post Covid-19 K&B Consumer Confidence survey have proved extremely encouraging for the industry, showing homeowners to be keen to carry on with their kitchen or bathroom projects as soon as they could. Click To Tweet

Of those who were already planning a new kitchen or bathroom, 80% said they had put the project on hold because of lockdown restrictions. But just over half of these (56%) said it was mainly down to the supplier or contractor being unable to do it or get hold of the required products.

This is compared to 30% who said the brakes had been applied because of their own financial concerns, and 14% who said it was because the household was self-isolating.

Overall, only 7% of projects were cancelled altogether and, in fact, 13% went ahead despite the lockdown.

Homeowners do have understandable uncertainty about their own financial circumstances but the good news for the KBB sector is that almost 1 in 5 projects currently on hold will be restarting as soon as possible, with a further 31% planning to restart when restrictions are lifted.

Only 3% think it is unlikely their project will go ahead within the next 12 months.

Where a project has been put on hold due to supply issues, 24% of consumers expect their project to restart as soon as possible, only 2% are not confident at all and feel that their project is unlikely to happen within 12 months.

“The results of this survey are very encouraging for the KBB industry as a whole and although understandably there is consumer caution especially where there has been a reduction in the household income, it would appear homeowners are keen for their kitchen and bathroom projects to recommence as soon as reasonably possible”

Jane Blakeborough, research director at Trend-Monitor.

The survey also asked those who said they weren’t planning a home improvement project before the lockdown if spending more time at home had made them consider it once the restrictions were lifted.

And more than one in six said that it did.

Although smaller projects such as replacing the toilet and basin in the downstairs cloakroom (22%) or replacing the kitchen worktops (18%) were in the top three projects to undertake, replacing the main bathroom was also high on the list (21%) and also replacing the kitchen (16%).

“This is a hugely encouraging snapshot of the way consumers are thinking as we emerge from the lockdown. There are two big findings here that confirm for definite what many in the industry were hoping, firstly that those who were planning projects will continue as soon as possible, and the second is that there is a building demand for new projects from people who have been stuck at home.

Andrew Davies, managing editor at Taylist Media

Additional Regional and Demographic Insights from the Survey

• The 25-34 age group were much more likely to have a project go ahead despite the lock-down restrictions (1 in 5 compared to 1 in 7 overall).
• The 65+ age group were the least likely to have a project go ahead despite the lock-down (less than 1 in 20)
• Northern Ireland and Wales had the most cancelled projects, 20% and 18% respectively. The South West (2%), East Midlands (3%) and London (4%) have the least cancelled projects.
• Scotland and the South West are most likely to give ‘self-isolating’ as the reason for projects being on hold or cancelled (17% each).
• The South West had the highest confidence rate with 29% of respondents from the South West indicating that they were ‘very confident’ that their project will be restarting as soon as possible (compared to 18% overall). This ties in with figures from Public Health England for confirmed coronavirus cases by region on 18 May, which shows the South West as having the lowest number of confirmed cases per 100k population (133 cases per 100k)
• Wales with the highest number of confirmed Covid-19 cases per 100k (413 cases per 100k) has one of the lowest confident rates, with only 4% indicating that they were very confident that their project would start as soon as possible and one of the highest cancellation rates

Research Scope

The study was undertaken via an online quantitative survey which questioned UK homeowners about their kitchen or bathroom projects that had been interrupted by the Covid-19 lockdown, and their confidence regarding restarting their projects within the next 12 months.

The survey was live between 12-18 May 2020

Research Methodology

The Trend-Monitor Omnibus Service* was used for this research which targeted a base of 1000+ UK homeowners aged 25+, within the ABC1 socio-economic classification.

The study format was a 3-minute online survey which included 5 quantitative questions, plus demographic questions to enable filtering of the data.

The results were ‘sense-checked’ against existing Trend-Monitor data for kitchen and bathroom projects in normal times, and against government data where the regional differences in consumer confidence tied in with regional differences in the number of Covid-19 cases per 100k population as at 19 May 2020.

The findings were presented as a pdf document and also as an online interactive dashboard which enables additional analysis and demographic filtering. Contact us to access this dashboard.

Respondent Demographic Profile

*Trend-Monitor partnered with Panelbase to gain access to the survey respondents. Panelbase supports and strictly adheres to the standards and guidelines set out by ESOMAR: www.esomar.org. Panelbase are also MRS company partners www.mrs.org.uk.