Helping DIY-curious consumers take their first steps towards proficiency – 24% of Americans cite a fear of messing up as a roadblock to starting a project (Frontdoor, 2025) – smart brands are creating confidence-building messaging and service design. Some of the best include artificial intelligence (AI) assistants featuring visual search and facilitating easy product replacement and product-recommending tutorials.

Both home improvement giants and indie brands are aligning themselves with a) the boom in women taking up trades, such as plumbing and carpentry, and b) a rising consumer desire for more tradeswomen (see below). Tactics include day-in-the-life content by brand-sponsored apprentices, becoming exclusive product partners to tradeswomen networks and running women-led classes for the public.

Increasingly sophisticated visualisation apps are enabling consumers to plan and shop makeovers with more speed, accuracy and imaginative flair than their predecessors. Endless AI-generated inspiration (in conjunction with advanced spatial recognition tech) transforms existing rooms – including deploying vast brand-owned colour libraries to generate complementary colour schemes for existing furniture – and surfaces shoppable products.

Shrewd paint brands are digging into the still-growing synergy between homeware and fashion (see Fashioning Aspirational Lifestyles in Luxury Fashion’s Cultural Pivot) via allure-enhancing Fashion Week activations and casting themselves as fashion-adjacent trend predictors.

Forward-thinking homeware and DIY brands are augmenting still-critical branded tutorials by establishing creator networks, crafting entertainment-led TikTok and Instagram miniseries and appealing to Gen Zers via trending purchase motivators (#DormTok).

A clutch of new-format smaller stores from major brands are giving city-dwelling home improvers ultra-convenient access to products, materials and advice – as well as acting as micro-fulfilment centres for home delivery.