As it marks its 50th year in business, Kitchens by Deane has dropped its room specific name and become a specialist in helping homeowners engage in rightsizing projects.
The business was founded in 1961 by Raymond Girard in Pound Ridge, N.Y., and moved to Fairfield County by son-in-law Peter Deane in 1980. Today his children Peter Deane and Carrie Deane Corcoran manage the two showrooms in Stamford and New Canaan. The business has recently changed its name to Deane to reflect its range of specialties.
“We kind of have it in our blood,” Peter Deane said. “I think our father and grandfather would be proud of what we”™ve done with the business.”
Both Deane and Corcoran were encouraged to take part in the business from a young age, but once done with schooling were also required to go out into the world and build skills before returning to the family legacy.
“That was our father”™s own little rule,” Deane said. “He wanted you to bring something to the organization, rather than just knowing the organization.”
Deane spent time in Colorado as a carpenter and worked in a mill shop in Pennsylvania ”“ from lumber to finishing. Corcoran went off to Chicago where she worked as a designer and helped run a kitchen showroom.
“It was all about getting exposure,” Deane said. He took over the organization in 1995, after his father died in 1991. “We had a succession plan in place and me and Carrie were part of that plan.”
Since taking over the company, Deane and Corcoran have digitized the entire business and use AutoCAD (computer aided design) programs to streamline the design-build process.
“The industry has changed in such a way that the level of detail in areas of the home, and kitchen particularly, is much more than it was 10 years ago,” Deane said.
Today about 25 percent of Deane”™s business is in Westchester County and the remainder is Fairfield County with jobs scattered among Manhattan and Long Island clients”™ second homes along the East Coast.
Corcoran said the kitchen and living area dynamic has changed in the Fairfield County home as well.
“Initially the kitchen was all about function and was a very utilitarian space; a hidden small back area,” Corcoran said. “But today the kitchen has really become the center of the home, a place people have invested more and more in, proportionally to the rest of the house.”
Kitchen remodels are one of the top value-adding projects for home resale, according to the Realtors Association of America. The average cost of a kitchen remodel project is $21,695 which will add an average of $15,790 to the value of a home; a 73 percent return on investment. The organization finds that the majority of major home improvement projects net a 50 to 60 percent return on investment.
Deane said making the kitchen a continuous part of the home has been reflected in trend throughout the Northeast region.
“People have had a tendency to come home and want to isolate themselves from the outside world in a space that was a little more pleasing to the eye,” Deane said. “That idea and style is strong right now, even within the very traditional geographical location of New England.”
Deane said in the down economy there hasn”™t been much new construction.
“The majority of projects reflect people deciding to upgrade,” Deane said. There has also been a trend in scaling back, he said, where prior to the recession many clients would have extravagant visions for their spaces.
“Today it”™s all about rightsizing and creating something that works, is updated, but makes sense,” he said. “Not as many people are looking for the twelve-foot ceiling or the ten bathrooms. With that said, in updates, kitchens and master baths are the two biggest areas that you see people renovating.”
Deane said though new building has fallen off and speculative residential building gone through the recession, there has been a very recent yet small return of both.
“You”™re seeing a couple pop up here and there right now,” Deane said. “There is definitely more confidence out there. The market as a whole has settled. Our clients are making decisions after the past couple years of gathering information. You can go drive through the local Fairfield County towns and see the business orders on the properties. They are up substantially over that last couple years and they are holding.”
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