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IKEA’s ambition to reach 100 million people in India by 2022 may not be possible for a few more years as its store launch in Bengaluru has been delayed indefinitely.
Two months after the opening of its first large format store in Hyderabad in August 2018, the Swedish home furniture/furnishings retailer celebrated the ground-breaking ceremony of its 5,00,000-sq-ft store in Nagasandra, Bengaluru which was scheduled to open in the summer of 2020. Its Mumbai store launches have also been delayed. Instead, the retailer launched its online store for Mumbai in August 2019, followed by an online store for Pune in January 2020.
“Our ambition is to reach 100 million people in India by 2022. We will establish a strong omnichannel presence in Hyderabad, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi/NCR and are also exploring other opportunities in India. It will be through a combination of big IKEA stores, smaller city-centre stores and online platform as a selling channel. Our Hyderabad store has completed two years in India and we are online today in Hyderabad, Mumbai and Pune” said Kavitha Rao, country commercial manager, IKEA India. Our Navi Mumbai store will open in the coming months and two smaller stores will also open in Mumbai during 2021, she added, without disclosing timeline for the Bengaluru store launch.
IKEA offers a range of home products for the living room, bedroom, kitchen, home furnishing accessories, small and large furniture as well as modular systems. Asked about its festival season offerings, Rao said: “We introduce 2,000 – 2,500 products every year. For the festival season, we have close to 600-700 new products for consumers. This is the first time we have created a specific festival collection for India that is also made in India.”
Festival collection
IKEA’s festival collection comprises a mix of two distinct collections named FINSLIPAD and KNASTRIGT, a colourful blend of textiles and decorations with a modern Scandinavian expression inspired by Indian folklore, priced at ₹199 1,590. The LJUV collection priced at ₹199 5,990 was designed in South India by Lebanese designer Nada Debs along with IKEA designers, showcasing her signature style of mixing material and patterns such as, wood and metals or ceramic and brass.
To cater to the value conscious market, IKEA recently introduced ‘New Lower Price’ initiative on some of its bestselling products across categories including chairs, toys, mattresses, bookshelves, sofas and products for bedroom, living room, kitchen and outdoor. It recently launched the ‘IKEA Family Credit Card by Citi’ which enables instant in-store bookings, direct payments via Bharat QR, EMIs and reward points. “We will also work on a host of other initiatives such as complete price solutions, increasing the number of articles at price points such as less than ₹200 or less than ₹3,000” said Rao.
On IKEA’s India performance, Peter Betzel, CEO and CSO, IKEA India, said: “It has been a significant year for IKEA India. During the year, over two million customers visited our Hyderabad store and over 25 million people visited us online. As more people have been forced to stay home, the interest in home furnishings has increased and online shopping grew significantly. Our emergency community support in India during Covid-19 included providing 4 million meals, 20,000 products and 1.1 million face masks/PPE with UNICEF.”
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