The Q2 2026 benchmarking report for UK kitchen retailers has just been published. Learn how the top 11 UK kitchen retailers perform across the digital space.
The latest Q2 2026 benchmarking report for UK kitchen retailers has just been published. It covers the largest 11 national kitchen retailers, including Magnet, Benchmarx Kitchens & Joinery, Harvey Jones Kitchens, Tom Howley, Wren Kitchens, deVOL Kitchens, Kutchenhaus, Kesseler, Howdens, Wickes, and Sigma 3 Kitchens.
The research gives an inside track on who is winning the biggest share of voice online and quantifies the gaps, risks and missed opportunities for other kitchen retailers to win brand exposure, generate online views and drive in-store footfall, where relevant. The report highlights quick wins that will improve enquiries from your online strategy and identifies the barriers that may be reducing your site’s ability to optimise digital performance.
To see a preview and contents page of the Q2 report, click here. To get a copy of the full report and the key takeaways, please complete the enquiry form or schedule a call.
For a glance into just 6 of the metrics we evaluated these top 11 kitchen retailers on, check out our quick-look table below;
Continue reading for further detail on this quarter's best and poorest-performing UK kitchen retailers or request a copy of the report for the full review.
The 70+ pages of research benchmarks each retailer based on 50+ metrics and indicators of successful digital strategy, including organic visibility, domain authority, paid media ads, conversion performance, technical performance, site speed, universal search, content, social ads, accessibility, and mobile performance.
Some of the leading players in the space are high spenders on paid media channels such as Google, Bing & Facebook - but have a poor or sub-optimal conversion improvement strategy. Without an optimised, sophisticated conversion strategy that maximises the conversion rate, the return on investment is unsustainable or will underperform. Scaling spend on paid media is not achievable unless the conversion rate delivers optimal performance in the sector. Some in the space have paid media spend levels from 30k+ per month but dedicate minimal resources and budgets to conversion testing. Given the cost per clicks on ad networks will continue to rise, we recommend spending at least 10% of your paid media budget on ongoing conversion optimisation testing schedules to ensure your paid media ROI maintains long-term viability, competitive advantage, and sustainability.
Pay-Per-Click marketing is constantly evolving, with more and more advertisers being forced to hand over a lot of control to Google's algorithms as the push for automation grows ever stronger. There are still key elements of control that we have though, the main one of these being budget which is ultimately something the algorithms can't take from you. That's why being smart with your budget and ad coverage is essential to achieving strong results and bettering what your competitors have to offer.
For Q2 2026, the average monthly budget wastage across these UK kitchen retailers was £87,179 with some of the top players in the market spending a considerable amount on areas and audiences unlikely to deliver a return. We can see this in more detail when looking at the average monthly cost per cost-per-click (CPC) amongst advertisers, with the average of this metric being £6. This highlights how competitive the market is and how important it is to control your budgets effectively.
There are varying monthly ad budgets across the competitors in the report. While this gap highlights the competitive advantage that larger budgets can provide, it's not just about spending more; it’s about spending smarter. By focusing on driving efficiency in campaign management, targeting, and budget allocation ,businesses with smaller budgets can still effectively compete with larger players. Investing in data-driven strategies and refining ad performance can help close the gap and maximise the return on every pound spent, enabling growth even in a competitive landscape. Relative to their spend, Benchmarx Kitchens & Joinery reported the lowest monthly cost-per-click (CPC) at £0, and Kesseler reported has the highest at £19 .
The report highlights the importance of budget efficiency by comparing monthly ad spend with estimated CPC in relation to your competitors, see who has the highest and lowest CPC. To maximise the effectiveness of your budget, it’s essential to focus on driving CPC down while maintaining or improving campaign performance. In this report, Tom Howley has the lowest estimate monthly ad spend at £42,000, and Wickes has the highest at £2,320,000.
By optimising targeting, refining ad copy, and leveraging data to identify high-converting opportunities, you can ensure every click delivers maximum value. This approach not only stretches your budget further but also boosts your return on ad spend (ROAS), enabling you to achieve stronger results without simply increasing expenditure.
Savvy digital marketers know that having a technically sound website is an essential component of a successful fully integrated digital strategy - plus a site capable of maximising conversion performance. Kitchen retailers will want to ensure that key pages, such as style/ colour options, pricing and payment information, and installation guides, are clearly signposted, so prospective customers can get all the information they need to place an order.
In our previous audit, Kesseler received the most 404 errors (516). This quarter, Kesseler remains the kitchen retailer to watch, and they’ve since increased their total to 522, suggesting they’re not regularly auditing their site for broken links. Websites that actively manage 404 errors often maintain stronger engagement metrics because users can consistently access the content they’re searching for. This creates a smoother and more reliable browsing experience overall.
When 62% of consumers are less likely to convert if they have a negative mobile site experience, ensuring that your site is quick and easy to load makes a significant improvement on your overall conversion rates. As with ensuring their site is easy to navigate with limited 4xx errors, kitchen retailers will want to provide a seamless, fast site experience for their users.
In our previous audit, Kesseler was the brand to watch for mobile site speed (21). This quarter, Kesseler has increased their score to 28, moving them up the leaderboard. Currently, the mobile site speed ranges between 40 and 25, with four brands in last place. Fast mobile site speed helps create a smoother, more enjoyable user journey. When everything works quickly and reliably, users are more likely to return, recommend the site, and build long-term engagement.
Domain authority is an essential metric for measuring the effectiveness of SEO performance, and helps create a reliable overall gauge of how effective your site is at achieving organic traffic, i.e. ‘free’ traffic that isn’t gained through sponsored ads. Kitchen retailers can look to creating content that home, food, and lifestyle publications will want to engage with, something that a digital PR specialist can assist with.
A ‘good’ DA really comes down to how your competitors are performing, however it’s generally considered average between 40 and 50, good between 50 and 60, and excellent above 60. Sigma 3 Kitchens received the lowest DA score (19). On the other hand, four brands scored in the ‘excellent’ zone (60+). Websites with strong authority tend to build greater trust with users. When people see a site ranking highly, they’re more likely to view it as credible and reliable.
A strong organic performance is strategically important as it ensures your site ranks above competitors for key, transactional keywords. When 93% of your customers won’t go past the first page of Google, your absence or lack of targeting for essential keywords will cost you conversions. Due to the cost of living crisis, we'd expect to see a fall in traffic to the kitchen retailer sector, due to consumers holding back on non-essential purchases, such as new kitchens.
Two brands reported a decrease in organic traffic on desktop, with deVOL Kitchens seeing the biggest loss (-39%) — a decrease from -14% previously. On mobile, three brands reported a decrease in organic traffic, with deVOL Kitchens also seeing the biggest loss (-23%). Wickes saw the biggest increase on both devices (+25,583% on desktop and +9,729% on mobile). Content formatting matters more on mobile. Large blocks of text that might be acceptable on desktop can feel overwhelming on a phone, which can discourage users from staying on the page.
Google Universal Search Results is an evolving opportunity to make your pages visible on a SERP (Search Engine Results Page). Universal results often appear before traditional listings and are eye-catching for users. Universal search results refer to rankings on a SERP that are not the traditional ‘blue line’ Google link, and a retailer can appear for universal search results without being strong in standard rankings. For kitchen retailers, 'image pack' is a strong opportunity to sell products directly from the SERP, with high-quality product images that engage prospective customers.
Howdens continues to secure the most Universal Search appearances (26,462) — a decrease from 29,557 previously. The majority of their appearances came from ‘images’ (19,600).
Longtail keywords are often considered high intent and potentially more likely to convert as a searcher is being more specific. Optimising for longtail keywords also puts your content strategy in a strong position to rank for retailer new search terms as they enter Google’s index. Kitchen retailers should look to consider phrases that include high-conversion intent terms, such as 'installation next week' or 'payment plan options', as a way to secure traffic from visitors specifically looking to buy.
Howdens continues to secure the most longtail keyword appearances for position 3 (6,000) — an increase from 5,873 previously. Howdens also continues to secure the most appearances for positions 4–10 (15,782) — a decrease from 16,318 previously. Longtail keywords can support better internal linking opportunities. With more focused topics, it’s easier to connect related pages and guide users through a logical content journey.
With the number of Facebook users in the United Kingdom (UK) hitting over 44 million users in 2023, it is not surprising that companies have jumped at the opportunity to advertise on the social media platform. Facebook’s UK digital advertising revenue has been estimated to have breached 2.6b GB pounds in 2019. For UK kitchen retailers, Facebook ads are an opportunity to ensure customers see availability, products, and deals.
We’ve included screenshots of Harvey Jones Kitchens’ sponsored Facebook posts. Opting for vertical media shows this retailer is optimising their content to use social media users on a phone (the most common device to access social media on).
When it comes to social media and on-site content strategies, it is important to release content that has a longer shelf life. An article is considered 'Evergreen' if it has maintained its relevancy to an audience for longer. It's great for your retailer engagement, but great for Google too, who will recognise content which achieves traffic over a long period of time. As with developing their digital PR strategy, kitchen retailers can look to developing content that fits with home, food, and lifestyle, in order to appeal to a wide variety of users.
Wickes continues to secure the most Facebook Likes (212,600) — an increase from 211,600 previously. deVOL Kitchens continues to secure the most Instagram followers (887,200) — an increase from 872,300 previously. Both Facebook and Twitter were the most popular social media platforms of all brands. deVOL Kitchens received the highest total engagement rate (4,922) and the highest average engagement (492).
20% of people in the UK have a disability – 2 million of which are people living with sight loss. In addition, 1 in 12 men and 1 in 200 women have some degree of colour vision deficiency. When websites are not designed to meet these needs, retailers lose customer interest as they turn elsewhere. For brands operating within the home improvement space, accessibility should be a key consideration for their site, as it will help convey that accessible design is also part of their approach to home solutions.
In our previous report, Wickes received the most accessibility alerts (125). This quarter, Wickes remains the retailer to watch, and they’ve since increased their total to 145. Accessibility alerts on websites are notifications or prompts designed to help users interact with content more easily, particularly those with disabilities or impairments. These alerts can appear as pop-ups, banners, icons, or floating widgets that provide accessibility options such as text resizing, colour contrast adjustments, or screen reader support. Many websites use them to show they’re making efforts towards inclusivity and usability.
To get a copy of the full report, please complete the enquiry form. If you want to talk to us about accelerating your digital performance, please call us on 01543 410014 or schedule a call with Rory Tarplee.