Global Management - Ikea

Ikea is the world’s most successful mass-market retailer, selling Scandinavian-stlye (hard-to-erect) home furnishings and other house goods in 230 stores in 33 countries and hosting 410 million shoppers per year. The company began operating in Sweden in 1943 with a cost obsession fused with design culture. The company aim is to lower prices across its entire offering by an average of 2% to 3% each year, its signature feature is the flat packed product that customers assemble at home which is their was of reducing transport costs. The company designs its own furniture, which is made by around 1,500 suppliers in more than 50 countries. Ikea has also diversified and sells online with a print run for more than 50 countries.

“At IKEA our vision is to create a better everyday life for the many people. Our business idea supports this vision by offering a wide range of well-designed, functional home furnishing products at prices so low that as many people as possible will be able to afford them.”

To keep growing, IKEA is accelerating store rollouts in both large outlet and new high-street formats. Nineteen new large outlets are set to open worldwide in 2006, at an average cost of $66 million per store. The firm plans to boost their profile in three of its fastest-growing markets: In Russia, where it is already a huge success in Moscow, in China, where is has a strong footprint, and in the US, where the goal is to have 50 outlets by 2010. IKEA demonstrates that, when underpinned by strategic partnerships with manufacturers and suppliers, providing access to affordable contemporary design, in an exciting, yet simple format can be a winning formula.

Ikea believes that the company can only move with each employee. From a video I watched, I gathered a list of what some of the employee mentioned:

Values straight

Down to earth

Not a place to be superstar or one man show

No roofs or hurdles

Have to be different

Dare to achieve and improve

Encouraged to try to new...