Why Furniture Is the One Category Retail Can't Figure Out Right Now

Originally published May 14, 2026. This version was rebuilt from primary sources for the FIN archive, and the facts are as of that date.

Retail as a whole had a good April. Furniture stores did not. That gap had been building for months, and by spring it was hard to call it a blip.

The short version

• Census estimated furniture and home furnishings store sales fell from March and from a year earlier, while total retail rose.
• Card data from the CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor showed furniture up from a year earlier, so the two measures disagreed on how bad it was.
• Home prices were still rising in most metro areas, which helped owners but kept movers on the sidelines.
• Sleep Number was rebuilding its line around comfort and value, and saw demand grow in March.
• Customer satisfaction slipped nationally while complaints rose, which matters a lot in a long, high-ticket sale.

Two ways of counting, one soft category

The Census Bureau's advance report put April furniture and home furnishings store sales down 3.6% from April 2025 and down from March, at a time when total retail sales were up from a year ago. The CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor, which is built from card transactions, had furniture stores roughly flat for the month and up from last year.

Those aren't measuring the same thing, so they don't have to match. What they share is the story that matters. Furniture was trailing the rest of retail and had lost its month-to-month momentum. A store owner can learn something from the gap, too. Check your own numbers to see whether tickets are holding while traffic falls, or the other way around, because the fix is different for each.

Rising home prices, frozen movers

NAR reported that prices rose in 71% of metro areas in the first quarter, with the national median for a single-family home just over $400,000. Price growth was slowing, and a growing share of markets had prices falling.

Equity helps homeowners who want to redo a room. The problem for furniture is that high prices and borrowing costs keep people from moving, and a move is the single biggest trigger for a big furniture order. Until turnover picks up, the replacement and refresh customer is the one to chase.

Sleep Number resets around value

Sleep Number's first-quarter sales were down sharply from a year earlier, and the company was still losing money. It had also reset its product line and marketing, and it said demand improved through the quarter and grew in March compared with the prior year.

The lesson reaches beyond bedding. Even higher-income shoppers want a clear reason to pay more. A smaller line where every price point has an easy, honest explanation sells better than a big line nobody on the floor can explain.

The experience gap

The American Customer Satisfaction Index slipped in the first quarter to the same level it held in 2013, and complaints hit a record. ACSI's read was that customers are sticking around for now while getting ready to leave once something better shows up.

Furniture is especially exposed to that. A sofa purchase takes weeks of research and then a delivery window, and one bad step after the sale can cost the next purchase and every referral that would have followed. Post-sale follow-up is cheap compared with replacing a customer.

The mood

Consumer sentiment from the University of Michigan fell again in April, to about where it bottomed out in mid-2022, with gas prices doing much of the damage.

Where this left furniture in mid-May

Shoppers had money but not much confidence, housing wasn't unlocking demand, and tariff costs were still in prices. The operators doing best were keeping their lines simple, making the value case clear and taking care of customers after the sale. Who should get the tariff refund money was the other open question, and we gave our view in Follow the Tariff Dollars.

Related on FIN

• Furniture Store Sales Fell 2.7%. Every Other Category Grew.
• Furniture Shoppers Are Holding Back

Sources

• U.S. Census Bureau, Advance Monthly Retail Trade, April 2026 (released May 14, 2026)
• National Retail Federation, CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor, April 2026 release
• National Association of Realtors, Q1 2026 metro area home prices release
• Sleep Number Corporation, First quarter 2026 results, Exhibit 99.1 to Form 8-K
• American Customer Satisfaction Index, National ACSI Q1 2026 release
• University of Michigan Surveys of Consumers, April 2026 final results