Ikea Looks to Asia for Growth, as Russia's Old Growth (Trees) Cause Concerns [Updated]

(Editor's note: The following has been updated with comment from Ikea.)

About 80 percent of furniture maker Ikea’s revenue comes from its stores in Europe — not the idea place you want to depend on your cash flow these days as the continent’s collective economy struggles to stay above water.

So Ikea is keeping itself busy expanding into – where else? – Asia, where it made $31.4 billion in its last fiscal year, which ended Aug. 31. Ikea had been opening one store a year in China but has now upgraded that to three, according to Bloomberg. And it is waiting to see what happens with legislation in India in hopes of entering that country’s retail space as well.

“Cautiously we are adding new markets,” Ikea CEO Mikael Ohlsson told Bloomberg. “We have big interest in opening in India. When the conditions are ripe in India we can start to prepare for an opening there.”Continue reading...