The 2020 Boom

The business of home remodeling. You’re either in it or you’ve interacted with someone in the trades. Its always been a lucrative market, now more so than ever.

With many people spending more time at home, there is an abundant need to clean up and beautify the entire house; both inside and out. General contractors such as those involved with home renovation projects, are slammed and literally cannot handle the workload. Many homeowners end up calling around to various contractors just based on availability alone. For instance, concrete contractors are heavily in-demand due to the shortage of qualified local contractors to be able to perform the work.

In this new “gig economy,” you see displaced workers from other industries moving into the trades, to stay employed. But not only to stay employed, many are starting their own businesses. I have met people still in college starting their own contracting businesses. It is a booming market, and everybody is trying to get their piece of the pie.

Prior to nationwide quarantines, there was always a need for these services. However, many people still spent most time at work, versus at home. Projects were slow to evolve. Today, purchases are made quickly and with confidence. The market has been flipped on its head, with everyone scrambling to fill the demand that exists in this new marketplace.

Industries such as cleaning services were not very in-demand. The demand was consistent but never growing or thriving. In today’s world, we see cleaning companies booked out for months, for both residential and commercial jobs. Home delivery services, remarkably similar. We always had steady growth, but not a large trajectory within a matter of months. Restaurants and retail stores quickly had to adopt new Standard Operating Procedures to meet the demands of their customers, on a dime.

Now services such as Uber, Lyft, and Amazon are literally part of our daily living expectations and needs. How will we get groceries, how will we get our new iPhone without some type of delivery service dropping at our doorstep?

It has not been even a full year yet, but you already see the reliance on these types of instant gratification services. The “I want it now” world we have always lived in has taken on a completely different scope entirely. Electronic payment online or even in stores is the expectation. Many places are not even able to break large bills due to the lack of inbound physical dollar bills they have in their drawer; they cannot give change. They ask you use some form of electronic payment due to the “coin shortage.”

While it seems that our economy is going downhill in some ways, I feel it is just morphing into something else. And while it morphs, there are mass changes that will affect millions of people. Displacement and replacement. Taking away from one industry and fulfilling the need in another.

For instance, commercial services. With the lack of need for exceptionally large extravagant buildings to house thousands of workers during the daytime hours, commercial building services are in extremely low demand. But if a company that traditionally has focused on commercial services switches to homeowners, they can fill that gap rather quickly and expound upon the need in a new market.

As we move into 2021 we will continue to see the rise in the need for homeowner services. Not to mention small business owners that run their businesses out of their home now. Many have gotten used to being at home, being more productive, and will never go back to a brick and mortar office. As I mentioned, the needs are not going away, they are just being displaced somewhere else.