The Custom Closet Industry is Ready for Innovation and Growth
It’s always good in the service business to be a settler, instead of a pioneer. The famous business axiom says “pioneers get slaughtered, settlers prosper”. The custom closet business has been a really dominant part of home improvement for the last 30 to 40 years. We believe that there’s a lot of room to grow in the closet space by doing things differently than people have traditionally done.
Up Closets is designed from the ground up to be a modern version of the traditional or legacy custom closet business and it is differentiated with:
- Lower fixed costs
- Lean labor model – commissioned salespeople and contract insallers
- No showrooms
- A work from home model
- Outsourced manufacturing
- Advanced marketing processes
- Greater efficiency
This combination of lower costs, greater efficiency, and cutting-edge marketing creates a powerful, sustainable business model that supports long-term success for franchisees. Up Closets provides an opportunity to tap into a lucrative and rapidly growing market without the financial and operational challenges of a traditional custom closet business.
The Trend for Closet Organization & Storage is Increasing
The demand for closet organization and storage solutions continues to rise as homeowners increasingly recognize the benefits of maximizing their space. With more people spending time at home and rethinking how their living spaces serve them, the need for efficient, customized storage solutions has never been greater.
Custom closets provide an opportunity to optimize every inch of a home, making it more functional and organized. As more individuals look to improve their homes rather than move, this growing trend is creating a thriving market for innovative storage solutions. To stay ahead, it’s crucial for businesses to adapt to this trend by offering products and services that meet customers where they are in their journey to create better living spaces.
“At Up Closets, we’re not just providing a product—we’re offering a solution that transforms homes into more functional, organized spaces. The demand for customized storage is growing rapidly, and we’re proud to be at the forefront of this trend, delivering exactly what today’s homeowners are looking for.” – Thomas Scott, Founder of Up Closets Franchise.
Meeting your Customer Where They Are is Key
Traditional custom closet businesses have average buyers who are in their 50’s, 60’s and even 70’s but Up Closets customers are primarily Gen Z, Millennials and even younger. These younger buyers have a very different buying process than older buyers do.
If you are a Millennial, you don’t like being sold and you don’t like to talk on the phone. You don’t want someone wasting 3-4 hours of your time in your home. Millennials absolutely revolt from that type of traditional sales process. So we designed our business process to cater to younger customers with frictionless sales. It’s a very non-pushy type of sales and it’s very transparent. Our pricing is very fair, and extremely competitive in the markets thanks to our outsourced product manufacturing. The opportunity to open a closet business in any city in the United States, even if there is well-established competition is very strong.
We Help People Make Their Space More Liveable
A custom closet business generally makes home much more livable. The most common reason that people want to sell a house is that they have outgrown the storage options. It’s not that the house itself is too small – they just don’t have room for all the stuff they have accumulated.
So when you go into a space like a pantry and you add 300% more storage space by simply having shelves at the right heights and you put in nine shelves for canned goods instead of the traditional four, you’re tripling the amount of stuff that you can put in a pantry and people think, “Wow, my house is much larger”. And then they love the house again.
Post Covid, more people are working from home and generally spending more time in their homes. A key realization is that homes often offer more potential than homeowners originally thought—they just need the right kind of organization. This is especially true for spaces that tend to become cluttered, such as closets, pantries, and garages. When these areas are optimized, the entire home feels larger and more functional.
Custom closets aren’t just about organizing belongings; they’re about maximizing space to its fullest potential, making homes feel more expansive and less chaotic. In turn, this makes homeowners appreciate their homes in a new way, reducing the urge to move and instead investing in transforming their current spaces into exactly what they need.
A Closet Improvement May Provide a High ROI for the Homeowner
We believe a laundry room makeover, redesigned pantry or custom closet in a bedroom has a high return on investment for the homeowner, particularly if they plan to sell in the future. People will choose one house over another because the closet spaces are well organized. That’s a big driver for sales and people get emotionally react to that.
In today’s market, even entry-level homes priced between $500,000 and $1,000,000 often feature basic, low-quality wire shelves in closets, as builders cut corners to reduce costs. This creates a significant opportunity for new custom closet franchisees. Homeowners are increasingly looking to upgrade their spaces, seeking better organization and higher-end solutions that improve both functionality and aesthetics.
Custom closets offer a clear solution, transforming a basic, often underwhelming feature of a home into a value-added, personalized space. For franchisees, this means a steady demand for closet upgrades in newly purchased homes, especially as buyers are unwilling to settle for subpar features in high-value properties
The Key Advantages of a Custom Closet Franchise Business
Let’s take a look at some of the key advantages to owning this modern, different kind of custom closet business.
Low Investment
In a city with less than half a million people, our small territory unit starts at $68,850. In bigger Metro areas of closer to a million people, our bigger unit costs $129,450.
We have extraordinarily good SBA programs. If you qualify, you can get in with 10 % down, so that’s a little less than 15,000 down for a small unit, or $30,000 for a large city.
Great Business for Families and Young Entrepreneurs
This is a particularly good business for families and young entrepreneurs. It’s a fun business to operate and works well for husband and wife teams that each want to contribute to the success of the business, as well as young entrepreneurs that just have that hustle to really grow a substantial business at a young age.
No Showrooms
We don’t use showrooms, so there is no expense for brick and mortar locations or retail space. We find that most people today want a person to come to them, in their space, or even do a virtual consult. They want immediate satisfaction when making decisions on big projects and our advanced design tools allow us to quickly bring their ideas to life.
Outsourced Materials
We don’t require our franchise owners to manufacture their own materials – it is much more cost-efficient to outsource the materials. We tie in with large-scale manufacturing companies that produce furniture for companies like Wayfair. All of our materials are US made- no imports. That means we don’t have supply chain problems that some traditional closet businesses face in the absence of raw materials.
Substantial Training Program
Our training program starts on day 1 and continues for the life of your franchise ownership with us. We don’t just teach you our systems and how to do the day-to-day work of a custom closet franchise, we teach you to be a successful business owner. After a few years with us, you would have acquired skills that would allow you to go run other types of business should you want to.
Positive Culture
Our culture is very important to us. We want to have fun, and we want our franchise owners to have fun and be profitable as quickly as possible. We value franchisees with a positive mindset that are passionate about running a business and are problem-solvers.
Ready to Take the Next Step Toward Owning Your Own Custom Closet Business?
With Up Closets, you can tap into a growing market and potentially scale a profitable franchise quickly with a modern, low-overhead model. Reach out by filling out the form or giving us a call. Don’t miss this opportunity—contact us today to learn more about becoming an Up Closets franchise owner.
