A Supersized more of the same?

KCMA’s September report gives us a sobering starting point. Participating manufacturers’ sales were down 6% year to date, while cabinet units were down 9.6%. Custom sales held nearly flat. Semi-custom and stock were both down more than 8%.

   A big thanks to Karen Koenig & Larry Adams from Woodworking News for providing these monthly cabinet numbers in an easy-to-understand format! 

Now put those numbers beside your business plan.

If the market is flat or down another 5% next year—where will your growth come from?

That’s a planning scenario, not a prediction. But it’s a question every manufacturer and dealer should be able to answer…..

“We’re budgeting for 10% growth” isn’t an answer. It’s a number in a spreadsheet. One that has no supporting story behind it.

Manufacturers: Why will dealers buy more from you next year?

Manufacturers compete on pricing, product, quality, service, and turnaround times. Those are real reasons a dealer chooses one supplier over another.

But what, specifically, are you improving?

• Pricing: Will an adjustment help dealers win profitable projects? How much additional volume will you need to recover the margin you give up? That’s always a good exercise to do.

• Product: Are you filling gaps that currently cost dealers sales?

• Quality: Will more orders arrive complete, correct, and ready to install?

• Service: Will dealers get faster answers, accurate information, and problems resolved without chasing five people?

• Turnaround: Will you shorten lead times—and consistently deliver when promised? What about replacement items?

• Dealer development: Will existing accounts give you more of their business, or will growth require new accounts? How many, buying how much, by when? Sprinkle in the lost ones when looking at the net. Are we at our goal yet? 😊

A discount might get you considered. Consistent execution gives the dealer a reason to keep sending orders.

And if you expect existing dealers to buy 10% more, explain why. Will they sell more kitchens? Move business from another manufacturer? Sell a higher-value mix?

Those are different growth plans. Honest engine question. Are you playing an active role in your customers’ success?

Dealers: What will you do differently to earn more business?

If your local market is growing, that’s great news. It also means it will be a magnet for more competition. They go fishing where those fish are. Say your market is stagnating. Growth would mean winning more jobs from your competition or increasing the value of what you sell.

Where will that happen?

• More qualified opportunities: Which referral sources, customers, builders, or remodelers will produce them?

• Better conversion: What will improve your closing ratio—response speed, follow-up, presentation, or a clearer value proposition?

• More repeat business and referrals: What happens after installation that earns the next introduction?

• Stronger execution: What will make customers and trade partners choose you again?

• Accountability: Who owns each improvement, and what gets measured every month?

These are exactly the kinds of questions we're tackling in Elevate, our leadership and business development program for kitchen and bath dealers and manufacturers. We're bringing industry leaders together to challenge assumptions, explore how AI is changing the competitive landscape, and turn good ideas into measurable improvements.

Because knowing what needs to change and actually making it happen are two very different things.

Cards on the table- I don’t see it, and it’s too bad. There is a long history of industries that have already faced the “Many small fish into a few big fish” consolidation process that our industry is looking right in the eye now. Although someone threw a solid gold wrench into this one and it’s called AI. The landscape has shifted and it’s all going to be about service, speed, convenience, and quick adaptability. The “Bigs got the slows” and that will make all the difference.

The question is… Just watch? You’ve seen how this movie ends. There is finally something that allows small independent owners to run like the bigs. It seems to require energy and leadership to make it run.

Now you have something to think about.

Through 2029, I expect the gap to widen between companies that can regroup and the ones that just group together. Just by the sheer math of the productivity increases the dealers will experience, the overall number of them will go down by a good bit. Those tickets are being sold at the new release of “Frozen in Time”.  

The US independent business owners make up about 46% of the private workforce and 44% of our GDP. They are also more focused on their local community, which I think is important.

You may not be able to see it yet, but it’s coming. Change.

So, where is your growth coming from?

That's one of the conversations we're having in Elevate, where kitchen and bath dealers and manufacturers are working together to strengthen leadership, embrace new technology, and develop strategies for competing in a rapidly changing industry.

If you're ready to do more than talk about change, I'd love to have you join the conversation.

Learn more about Elevate

Or just grab some time and let's chat.

Thad