Windows Market Insights Reports: Residential Windows Contractors
Results
- Contractors surveyed reported concerns about the cost and longevity of high-efficiency windows and general skepticism about the technology.
- Contractors are hesitant to recommend or provide bids for high-efficiency windows unless requested by the customer.
- Nearly all contractors look to manufacturers for residential window training and information, and they tend to prefer winter training sessions.
Highlights
Objectives
The Wise Window Hub (WWH), an initiative under Minnesota’s Efficient Technology Accelerator (ETA), set out to understand how residential windows contractors, key market factors influencing high-efficiency window adoption, perceive these products.
Scope
The WWH team conducted two primary data collection efforts in 2025, a contractor survey (N=39) of residential windows contractors in MN and semi-structured interviews (N=10) with survey respondents.
Benefits
This market study underscored the importance for the WWH to support existing and new efforts to expand contractor knowledge of high-efficiency window technologies and provide contractors with a robust communication toolkit for discussing these products with homeowners.
This report details windows contractor views on residential windows and emerging windows technologies, including high-efficiency products like triple-pane windows. This report represents two research efforts: a survey of 39 residential windows contractors in MN and 10 semi-structured interviews with previous survey respondents. This effort largely represents the views of contractors at smaller companies who primarily worked on retrofit or replacement projects.
The data-driven insights provided in this report serve to benchmark current perceptions of high-efficiency window technologies, identify barriers and opportunities to expanding their market presence, and track key market progress indicators for the Wise Window Hub. This report provides strategic insight and information on contractor awareness and perceptions, sales insights, thoughts on customer perceptions, business challenges, and resource and training needs.