The future is shiny white

Tommy Trinder’s Annual Colour Trends survey has shown that 2024 was ‘alright for white’.

After years of losing the battle to foils like Chartwell green and agate grey, 2024 has seen a resurgence in smooth white as the finish of choice for PVC-U windows; 65% of all PVC-U casements in the year were unfoiled.

The Tommy Trinder Annual Colour Trends survey, which crunched the data from over half a million PVC-U windows, quoted by over 600 installation firms, suggests a sustained underlying upward trend for standard white windows.

“When you dig into the data, white has been slowly re-gaining market share against the foils for about three years,” said Tommy Trinder CEO, Chris Brunsdon. “In 2021, only a little over half of all windows were white. We’ve seen steady gains year on year to reach the 2024 milestone of 65% – it’s quite a re-bound.”

Meanwhile, when it comes to foils, grey, in many shades, continues to dominate and remains the preferred finish for almost one in five casements. Anthracite (11%) and agate (4%) still top the charts, followed by a plethora of ‘other greys’ such as basalt, hazy, stone, quartz, and dusty.

Traditional woodgrains remained in the doldrums in 2024, according to the Tommy Trinder data, with only Rosewood (4%) seeing significant volumes. Mahogany, an old favourite, was notable by its absence. Volumes for oak (Golden and Irish) declined from 2% to 1% during the year with others such as amaranth, English, natural, coriander and cinnamon failing to establish a meaningful niche.

Overall, the Tommy Trinder data paints a picture of a highly fragmented colour pallet with installers presenting a dizzying array of choices to homeowners.

“The activity from Tommy Trinder installers suggests we have truly become a rainbow nation when it comes to fenestration,” said Chris. “It’s staggering to note that more than 2,000 different colour combinations were quoted on PVC-U casements during the last year.

“Such vast choice is wonderful for the homeowner, but it does mean great complexity for the installers,” continued Chris. “Tommy Trinder subscribers tell us that being able to touch and show clients exactly how a window will look in a variety of colourways has become a vital part of their sales process. Modelling a window on the house in full photo-realistic quality, then backing that up with full colour, photo-realistic inside and outside views of the product on quotes and contracts not only wows customers, it also removes any room for error.”

The Tommy Trinder survey also highlighted the growing popularity of flush casements; over a quarter of PVC-U windows quoted by installers on Tommy had flush sashes. Smooth white was markedly less popular as a finish on PVC-U flush casements accounting for just 27% of all windows quoted.

Chris commented: “We have over 600 window firms using the app so it’s a solid representation of the market.  However, it’s likely that our typical subscriber’s product mix is somewhat skewed towards the top end.

“Upselling occurs naturally when it’s quick and easy to show off premium features, such as foils, dual colours, dummy vents, mechanical joints, flush casements, surface mounted bars etc. It stands to reason that Tommy Trinder users will sell more of these value-added products.”