Colour Rising

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Whether windows or doors, masonry paint, cladding or roofline, the use of colour in exterior home improvements has grown more popular year on year, writes Freefoam’s Colin St John.

Colour windows and doors now make up an estimated third of the market, while some leading window systems companies’ colour and woodgrain sales have overtaken traditional white at 60:40.

At Freefoam, we’re seeing similar growth in roofline and cladding, with woodgrain and colour sales of both increasing significantly in the last few years.

 

Trends

The vogue for colour shows no sign of abating. Tis summer, The Independent released a guide specifically on coloured PVC-U windows, while All Weather Paints noted a shift towards earthy shades such as Olive Green or monochromatic use of grey in masonry paint trends.

It’s a movement that can pay dividends for stockists and installers. Colour products are inherently more attractive, adding kerb appeal to a property, and enhancing its value.

 

Adding property value

Marco Helliwell, founder and CEO of mypropertyadvice.com, recently told Dulux that keeping up with colour fashions for exterior paint, surface materials or front doors can help increase a property’s asking price by up to £20,000.  Feedback from Freefoam registered installers supports this, as many say offering a choice of colour helps them attract more leads, differentiate their businesses and upsell.

 

Grey days

Greys continue to be popular – 60% of our Fortex cladding sales are grey, for example. It’s a particularly practical shade for exterior home improvements, being a neutral that works well with other shades and instantly brings properties up to date but doesn’t highlight dust and dirt as white does.

We offer four greys across across the Fortex cladding range, including a dark Anthracite, launched earlier this year. This hue has been trending on windows, doors and bi-folds for the past four to five years and shows no sign of slowing – so installers can match cladding and roofline to a suite of windows for a total house transformation.

 

Upselling

Chris Cutts, of roofline and cladding installer CR Roofing Services of Barnsley, agrees. He says: “I’ve been working in roofline and cladding for nearly 20 years and there’s definitely been a move towards colour products recently. Now, colour is more popular than white, across the board.

“We’ve seen a big shift towards greys, such as Anthracite, for roofline and cladding. Homeowners want to get rid of their old rosewood or mahogany timber cladding and replace it with more contemporary colours. People are also more likely to get the full house done, seeing it as an all over job and match the fascia to the cladding. 

“The project we won Freefoam’s installer competition for in July is a prime example. The homeowners wanted their old timber Tudor board, which was rotten, replaced with Anthracite grey board from Freefoam. We were able to colour match the garage door and windows with Freefoam fascia and roofline in Anthracite as well. We fitted black guttering and downpipes for the finishing touch. The full property took four days to complete, and the customers were over the moon with the result. It’s brought the house right up to date.”

 

Lead times

Whatever shades homeowners choose for their roofline or cladding, they want their investment to last. Freefoam manufactures one of the most advanced PVC-U and PVC-UE fascia and soffit ranges using our patented Colourmax technology, which means we can offer colour variety, colour-matching and colour-fast options across our range – and quickly too. So there’s no lead time on our standard eight fascia and soffit colours and no lead time at all on any cladding colours – a big advantage for stockists and installers.

It also enables us to confidently offer a 10-year guarantee on colour (with a 50-year extended guarantee on white for registered installers).

 

Pictures: Freefoam’s Anthracite grey roofline and fascia is a popular option to match with windows and doors of the same colour.

Article written by Brian Shillibeer
24th October 2023

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