The company’s fourth and biggest store in
India opened in the country’s tech hub of Bengaluru, four years after IKEA
entered the Indian market.
IKEA India plans to source more products locally
to combat rising inflation, as the Swedish furniture group looks to sell more
to the country’s burgeoning middle class with the launch of its latest store on
Wednesday.
The company’s fourth and biggest store in
India opened in the country’s tech hub of Bengaluru, four years after IKEA
entered the Indian market.
The store, spread over 460,000 square feet,
will sell a wide selection of the brand’s home products and furnishings,
including the popular Billy bookcase and Fargrik mugs.
he furniture maker is betting big on home
furnishings in Bengaluru, where rental spaces are more affordable and bigger
than Mumbai, where IKEA has two stores.
As prices soar, the average Indian is
becoming more conscious of spending on non-essential items.
India’s retail inflation touched an
eight-year high in April, easing marginally last month.
“We need to work on local sourcing which
will help us to lower prices even more. We are working with our own costs to
keep them down as much as possible, so that is how we navigate with
affordability,” Susanne Pulverer, Chief Executive Officer and Chief
Sustainability Officer at IKEA India, told Reuters on Tuesday.
IKEA sources about 25% to 27% of its
products locally, with a goal to increase that to at least half in the long
term.
The company said it had been sourcing
textiles and carpets locally in India for a long time and it planned to broaden
that to its wood-based flatline furniture.
Still, high import duty has always been a
sore point for global corporates to operate in India, with import tax on
furniture at 25%.
“Import duty has an impact on prices and
competition and it is not a fully open market but it is a part of doing
business,” Pulverer added. Courtesy: www.financialexpress.com
