Spending cools in home furnishings – High-income households lead pullback in Q1

Most home furnishings retail channels experienced a year-over-year decline in consumer spending during the first three months of 2025.

Spending cools in home furnishings – High-income households lead pullback in Q1

Fast Facts

Overall spending at home furnishings retailers declined 5% in Q1
High-income households saw the steepest pullback in spend
The kitchen, décor, appliances, and rent-to-own retail channels grew
The mattress/bedding channel and diversified retailers such as Bed Bath & Beyond and Wayfair continued to underperform

New York – Most home furnishings retail channels experienced a year-over-year decline in consumer spending during the first three months of 2025.

According to tracking data from Consumer Edge, only four channels (which it defines as “categories”) experienced growth compared to Q1 2024: kitchenware retailers, décor retailers, appliances/electronic retailers and rent-to-own home furnishings retailers.

The findings are based on credit card and debit card transactions from January through March 2024.

“This data is from before [President Donald Trump’s] larger-than-expected tariff announcement on April 2,” noted Michael Gunther, VP and head of insights at Consumer Edge. Spending pulled back in every income group, with the steepest falloff among high-income households, he added.

Consumer Edge, a data intelligence firm, groups together DTC, omnichannel and physical retail stores in its tracking of consumer spending.

The Diversified category encompasses retailers that specialize in a variety of home furnishings goods such as Wayfair, At Home, Bed Bath & Beyond and Crate & Barrel. The Mattress/Bedding category includes brands such as Helix Sleep, Mattress Warehouse, Denver Mattress, and DreamCloud. The Furniture category includes brands such as Bassett Furniture, Bob’s Discount Furniture, Havertys Furniture, and Slumberland Furniture. The Kitchen stores segment include companies such as Williams-Sonoma and Sur La Table as well as pure plays like The Pampered Chef and any DTC sales from kitchen brand websites.

The Q1 data follows on after a promising Q4 2024, where year-over-year consumer spend growth at home furnishings merchants improved by over 400 bps sequentially. On a year-over-year basis, Q1 2025 spend declined 5% – a deceleration of 200 bps from Q4 2024.

[Editor’s note: The original version of this story incorrectly identified the changes as taking place on a quarter-over-quarter basis.]

Diversified brands continued to underperform compared to Q4, led by Beyond’s Bed Bath & Beyond and Overstock.com brands where skus rationalization efforts led to meaningful declines, according to Consumer Edge.

The Décor and Rent-to-Own categories continued to be bright spots in home furnishings, led by TJX’s Home Sense brand, which experienced strong growth during the quarter driven by store openings. Trends at HomeGoods and Pura Scents also continued to be strong. UPBD’s rent-to-own brand Acima continued to perform well, likely due to consumers’ constrained budgets

Other findings on a year-over-year basis:

Spend at Wayfair.com and Kirkland’s underperformed during the quarter, contributing to weak online performance in the Diversified category.
In the Flooring/Rug category, spend at Empire Today and Rugs.com was soft, likely driven by a significant pull-ahead in spend in this category during the pandemic.
Consumer spending growth worsened significantly in the Mattresses/Bedding segment. A few brands experienced year-over-year growth, including Helix Sleep (also a top performer in Q4), Mattress Warehouse, Denver Mattress and DreamCloud. Underperformers included Purple, Casper and Sleep Number.
Spend performance by price point in the Furniture category was mixed, as Bassett Furniture, Bob’s Discount Furniture, Havertys Furniture and Slumberland Furniture led growth, while Ethan Allen, La-Z-Boy, and West Elm declined.

So far, the read on early April isn’t encouraging. “The data suggests that [consumers] are deferring their purchases,” said Gunther. He added that the trend is taking place across a wide variety of businesses, not just retail.