Window & Door’s annual Top 100 Manufacturers list details North America’s 100 largest manufacturers of residential windows, doors, skylights and related products, based on sales volume. Much of the information comes from companies directly, which our research team verifies and fact-checks. Our team also researches and fact-checks information for companies that do not participate in our survey, which are indicated by an asterisk beside their names. This year’s list further solidified what we’ve been seeing for several years now: the industry is healthy and continues to grow.•

A Pattern of Growth

This year’s survey queried companies if they had experienced measurable growth in the past five years. Only seven companies said no, although 10 responded “unsure.” Seven companies posted revenues that put them in higher categories than in past years.

Year over year, only one company on this year’s list had lower gross sales in 2018 than in 2017. Nearly every other company reported their revenues were higher. The increased sales volume makes sense in the face of 2018 recognizing a 2.8 percent gain in single-family starts, according to research from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Commerce Department.

Remodeling also continues to be a boon for product manufacturers, with the U.S. home remodeling market expanding more than 50 percent since the end of the Great Recession, according to the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies, jchs.harvard.edu.

Challenges

Strong growth, however, poses its own challenges. Many companies in this year’s list cited “staying ahead of and managing growth” as a top challenge. Growth also requires more people, which aligns with Window & Door’s Industry Pulse survey published earlier this year, which found that 71 percent of survey respondents plan to hire in 2019. Recruiting and retaining those people remains one of the industry’s greatest challenges, as Window & Door continues to explore in its ongoing Workforce Development series.

Costs also continue to climb. Many Top 100 companies attribute this to tariffs and rising transportation costs. (For more information about freight challenges, see In the Trenches.)

Five-year Growth

In the past year, Harvey Building Products saw the biggest revenue category jump from $100 Million to $200 Million to $300 Million to $500 Million this year. It’s been working toward solid growth for several years, though. Since 2016, the company acquired Soft-Lite, Northeast Building Products, and Thermo-Tech, all of which Harvey credits for its growth.

Starline Windows moved to the $500 Million to $1 Billion category, up from $300 Million to $500 Million, which the company attributes to a new facility in 2016 that allows Starline to book more projects.

Earthwise Group, meanwhile, shares that in the past five years sales have increased by more than 75 percent and the company hired more than 1,000 new employees. It also launched two start-up manufacturing plants and acquired three others.

YKK AP, one of the largest companies on our list at more than $1 Billion, expanded its production capabilities and moved into a new manufacturing facility totaling more than 500,000 square feet.

Numerous other companies on this year’s list also shared how acquisitions and facility expansions have helped their growth in the past five years.

The Index

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