The question he gets most often is when the store opens, which shows Romanians are interested in IKEA, Ohlsson told ZF in an interview. He added the company was doing well in Romania.
He did not say when the next store should open, though. The representatives of the store in Baneasa (northern Bucharest) had previously said they were looking at several major cities across the country but had not made a decision about the future location.
A market of 19 million people needs to be approached step by step and IKEA will have more stores in Romania, its CEO said.
Ohlsson, 55, the right hand man of IKEA’s founder Ingvar Kamprad, came in Romania in the month when the company’s only store in this country celebrates five years in business. Another purpose of his trip was to talk with the local suppliers.
IKEA has had Romanians suppliers of furniture since before 1989. It currently has about 40 in this country but is looking for more, because there is no cap on how many the company can have, Mikael Ohlsson said. According to previous estimates by ZF, IKEA buys several hundred million euros’ worth from Romania and its biggest suppliers are Sortilemn, Ecolor, Gilmet, Apulum, Cesiro, Plimob and Princo.
Asked about what advice he would like to give a Romanian entrepreneur in this industry, IKEA’s CEO said he would tell them to think globally, because many plants in this country do not try to compete on the international market. At the same time he would recommend a retailer to talk to its customers, explaining that IKEA goes to people’s houses for interviews in the cities where it opens stores.
IKEA operates only one store in Romania, which in the catalog year 2011 (September 2010-August 2011) posted 361.8 million (EUR83 million VAT included) in sales, up 10.5% on the previous year. (EUR1=RON4.3575)
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)