For you. World globe An icon of the world globe, indicating different international options. Get the Insider App. Click here to learn more. A leading-edge research firm focused on digital transformation. Good Subscriber Account active since Shortcuts. Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders. It often indicates a user profile. Log out. US Markets Loading H M S In the news. Shoshy Ciment. Ikea, the Sweden-based furniture store chain, operates stores in 52 markets around the world across nearly 50 countries.
Ingvar Kamprad founded Ikea in when he was 17 years old and originally sold pens, wallets, and picture frames. The chain expanded to the US in Here's what the store looked like when it first opened.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories. The story begins with a year-old Ingvar Kamprad. The same problems cropped up in tableware, where dinner plates and glasses were too small for American customers.
Consequently, the stores lacked big tables and large serving platters. Then there were complaints about quality. One wag joked, "Ikea is Swedish for chipboard. D'Amico says that all of these issues have been addressed. The retailer learned that some people didn't want to do it all by themselves, so Ikea now delivers orders and sends someone to assemble them—for a price, of course. It also has a planning and design department to assist customers with outfitting a kitchen or a home office.
The company has been criticized for being environmentally unfriendly—its subsidiary, Swedwood, cuts down about 1, acres of forest a year and uses up 1 percent of the world's wood supply. Worse, its cheap furniture frequently winds up in landfills. In answer to these charges, the company has become almost fanatical in its quest to be perceived as green, energy efficient, and socially responsible. In , it named its first environmental manager, and today there is a separate division dedicated entirely to environmental concerns.
Its goal is to run all stores and operations with renewable energy and make its products as sustainable as possible. Ikea obsessively touts its green credentials. In , to emphasize that it was a design-driven company, Ikea launched the PS collection, which employed a host of noted designers to create a fresh, forward—looking line that didn't lose sight of the retailer's basic tenet of affordability.
And in a masterstroke of showmanship—something in which the company has always specialized—it introduced PS during the Milan Furniture Fair, stealing the spotlight from the Italians. Because the line attracts so much attention from the global press, a new PS collection is introduced every two or three years.
In , to strengthen its credentials in the quality department, Ikea introduced the Stockholm Collection, an upscale line employing full grain leather, hardwoods, and natural fabrics like wool and mohair. Ikea is zealous in its goal to understand its customers. In California, it realized that it might not be reaching the Golden State's large population of Hispanics, so Ikea's designers visited the homes of its Hispanic staff members and, after observing their living spaces, added more large-scale furniture, bold colors, and elaborate picture frames to the Ikea offerings.
The store's staff is now visiting customers' homes in Philadelphia to help solve design problems, both to be helpful and to get inside customers' heads. Ikea wins praise from many design pros. She believes that the furniture is comfortable and people-friendly. Do they know who the product is really for?
In retailing, success breeds envy—and knock-offs. It failed, lacking the incredible resources that Ikea has at its disposal. For updated information on what applies to your country, please visit krisinformation. To most present-day Swedes, the date and the names, in a famously rural region, resound of harsher times, when Sweden was agrarian and poor.
They speak of hard work, frugality and egalitarianism rooted in shared poverty — values which would eventually enter the IKEA ethos. Kamprad began his career at the age of six, selling matches. When just ten, he criss-crossed the neighbourhood on his bicycle, selling Christmas decorations, fish and pencils. In , when Ingvar was 17, his father rewarded him with a small sum of money for doing well in school, despite being dyslexic.
Starting a business in Sweden. Swedish design. The idea is to measure the purchasing power of different currencies. In , he started selling furniture made by local manufacturers. This forced him to design items in-house. Kamprad was also behind the simple, yet revolutionary innovation that is the flatpack. He began selling IKEA products in flatpack form, from his own warehouses.
Thus the basic IKEA concept — simple, affordable flatpack furniture, designed, distributed and sold in-house — was complete.
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