How To Build a Furniture Emipire IKEA

Since it opened its first store in 1943, IKEA has become one of the biggest furniture empires in the world. The company has made people think differently about the way they furnish their homes, particularly in countries like Germany, the UK, and France. Over 365 million people worldwide spend more than £8 billion in IKEA stores each year and the number of the costumers keep rising. The best selling products are bookshelves, sofas, candles, chairs, and coat hangers, but perhaps IKEA is most famous for its flatpack furniture.

Flatpack furniture was invented by chance in 1956 by a man called Gillis Lundgren. He lived in a Swedish town called Almhult and worked for a small furniture company. One day Lundgren needed to deliver a table to a costumer, but the table wouldn’t fit in his car. ”Let’s pull off the legs and put them underneath” said Lundgren and that easy the moment flatpack furniture was born. From that simple beginning, the small furniture company became IKEA and Lundgren became one of its top designers.

The secret of IKEA’s success is not just the design, it’s also the price. Flatpacks don’t take up much space, so IKEA can send furniture round the world very cheaply. Also the stores don’t employ lots of sales people to help you find or carry things; it seems people don’t mind doing that for themselves. And most importantly, IKEA doesn’t pay anyone to put the furniture together, they let the costumers do that. Apparently, people would rather pay less and build the furniture themselves. However, not everyone seems to find easy. When the actor Russell Crowe was trying to put together some bedroom furniture, he got so frustrated that he attacked the flatpack with a knife. He finally had to ask someone to help him.

There are now over 200 IKEA stores in more than 30 countries and every time a new store opens it’s front-page news. In 2005, when London’s fourth IKEA opened business at midnight, there were 6.000 people waiting outside. When people began shopping, the store became so crowded that the manager told the staff to close the doors. Even tough the store was only open for 40 minutes, IKEA had already sold all 500 sofas that were on special offer!