The annual average of furniture manufacturer and retailer employee pay has increased, says new data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

According to its latest Annual Survey of Earnings in the year to April 2023, the furniture manufacturing sector as a whole saw average annual pay rise by 4.7% to £30,703. Within this sector, data suggests that the office furniture manufacturers pay rose 3.6% to an average of £31,405 per annum.

Meanwhile, mattress manufacturers pay declined 4.7% to an average of £25,397, while other manufacturing sectors, including cabinet and upholstery, saw a rise of 7.3% to £29,214 per year.

As for furniture and carpet retailers pay, this has increased 9% to an average of £28,676 and 3.3% to £28,313 respectively.

Furniture and carpet wholesalers pay also rose by 12.7% to an average annual wage of £40,480.

Breaking down the data even further, the average pay of male furniture manufacturers stood at £32,064, an uptick of 5.8%. There wasn’t any data to suggest this for female pay in this sector.

The average pay of male furniture retailers stood at £33,380, an uptick of 8%, while female pay had an average of £22,398, representing an increase of 10.9%, but still over £10,000 behind that of male pay.

As for overall hourly pay, furniture manufacturers average at £15.98 an hour, up 6.5% on an annual comparison. Mattress manufacturers average rate per hour rose 7.4% to £14.49. Carpet manufacturers average hourly rate has risen 3.7% to £22.07.

As for furniture retailers, the average rate of pay per hour is £16.51, up 9%, and for carpet retailers, this stood at £14.78, increasing 3% year-on-year. These are all above the current National Living Wage (23+) of £10.42 per hour, which saw an annual rise of 9.7%.

On an overall viewpoint, the ONS said that gross annual earnings for full-time employees was £34,963 in April 2023, which is a 5.8% increase in April 2022.

The gender pay gap has been declining slowly over time; over the last decade it has fallen by approximately a quarter among full-time employees, and in April 2023 it stands at 7.7%.

Commenting on the figures, ONS head of earnings statistics Nicola White said: “Our detailed annual survey shows that in the year to April 2023, employees saw their pay growing at its fastest in cash terms since comparable records began, but once inflation is taken into account, people’s pay fell again in real terms.

“Thanks partly to increases in the National Minimum Wage, lower-paid groups saw faster earnings growth over the year than those higher up the pay scale. The full-time gender pay gap was very little changed on the year, but has fallen by about a quarter over the last decade and remains smaller than it was before the coronavirus pandemic.”