Ikea UK has today announced continued growth, generating a turnover of £2.46bn. This strong UK performance comes as the wider Ingka Group announces global retail sales of €41.7bn, an increase of 5.7% on €39.5bn in FY22.
The homeware giant, which celebrates its 80th anniversary this year, credited continued investment for this growth. It also reported 38.5% of total sales were made online (35.8% in FY22).
As the popularity of online shopping continues to grow, Ikea UK opened a multi-million-pound distribution centre in Dartford, with the capacity to deliver one million orders annually. Enabling faster and more sustainable home deliveries to customers in London and the southeast, the new centre is operated by 100% renewable energy and operates a fleet of electric vehicles to fulfil orders, driving a significant reduction in CO2 emissions.
Long-running environmental sustainability initiatives were also the focus of investment, including £4.5m in EV charging infrastructure to enable 100% zero emissions deliveries by 2025.
In the northwest, three Plan & Order Points (smaller stores dedicated to kitchen, bedroom, and living room planning) in Aintree, Stockport and Preston have improved access to free planning support for millions. Increasing the retailer’s physical access to its customers continues to remain a priority, with the ambition for further locations in the northwest and beyond set to open in FY24 – in addition to the opening of a new city store on Oxford Street. In all, FY23 saw 1m new visits to Ikea UK stores – an uplift of 2.2%.
To meet customers in new, more locally accessible ways, a range of new services were also introduced including 15 new external locker pick-up points in collaboration with Shift (bringing the total to 24), and the trial of 12 mobile pick-up points across the UK in collaboration with Tesco.
In the digital space, Ikea has increased capacity and capabilities to meet its customers remotely. Be that online or over the phone, customers can access the same home furnishing expertise available instore, which has resulted in a 24% year-on-year growth in remote sales.
Peter Jelkeby, CEO and chief sustainability officer, Ikea UK & Ireland, said: “Over the past 80 years, we have developed our offering, value chain and sales channels, supporting our vision to create a better everyday life for the many people.
“As we look back on the last year and forward to the next 80, we constantly ask ourselves, how what we do today can be done better tomorrow. Over the past year, we have made significant investments on this journey to create a more accessible, affordable and sustainable Ikea, to meet the evolving needs of UK households.”
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- How does Ikea attract ten times more traffic to its website than its nearest rival?
- Amazon’s successful push into homeware during the pandemic and the growth of marketplaces
- How this sector is already leading the way in terms of AR uptake and approval
