E-commerce Strengthens Foothold on Furniture Industry Furniture Industry Sales
October 12,
2018 by Laurie Northington in General 
This is the first factoid in a series of five factoids detailing the rise of e-commerce in the furniture industry. As many brick and mortar stores search for strategies to compete with giant online retailers, those same retailers are looking for ways to remain profitable.
It is estimated that 2017 internet sales of furniture alone from both brick and mortar and pure e-commerce retailers totaled an estimated $19.7 billion or 18.8 percent of the total industry.
The retail furniture industry reached $105.2 billion last year, a growth of 3.9 percent over 2016. Of the $105.2 billion industry total, sales can be distributed between (1) brick and mortar stores, (2) e-commerce retailers plus e-commerce sales by brick and mortar companies, and (3) mail order houses. Pure e-commerce retailers are those that do not have physical store locations, like Amazon or Wayfair, or their e-commerce is operated as a separate business unit, like Walmart.com. Additional e-commerce sales from brick and mortar stores total only 1 percent of the total industry.
Last year furniture and bedding sales by brick and mortar stores (non internet) totaled $83.1 billion compared to $19.7 billion e-commerce (all outlet types), and $2.3 billion from mail order houses.
E-commerce continues to gain a greater share of the furniture industry – jumping from 5.1 percent of sales in 2006 to 18.8 percent in 2017. Meanwhile, brick and mortar share of total sales fell from a 92.2 percent share to 79.0 percent – decreasing dramatically as the economy improved after 2009.
Source: Impact Consulting Services Inc.’s FurnitureCore.com proprietary Industry Model; U.S. Census Bureau’s Annual Survey or Retail Trade (e-commerce) with all sales revised in March 2017. 2017 preliminary estimates