Furnishing your home? Know all about IKEA

IKEA furnitures, privately held, international, low-cost home products are an inevitable part of interior furnishings at many houses in the world. IKEA furnitures are marked for its modern utilitarian design. The company has 250 retail outlets in 34 European countries while 24 new stores are on the line to be opened in 2007 including India. At this moment of this house product's successful expenditure, its history will enable you to understand how this furniture will add charm to your house interiors.

IKEA was founded in 1943 by a 17-year-old Ingvar Kamprad in Småland, south of Sweden. IKEA formed its name from the founder's initials (I.K.) plus the first letters of Elmtaryd and Agunnaryd, the farm and village where he grew up from a farmer to a businessman. Ingvar sold whatever he found could fill with a product at a reduced price under the brand name of IKEA. When Ingvar Kamprad outgrew his ability to make individual sales calls in 1947, furniture was introduced into the IKEA product range. Local manufacturers in the forests close to Ingvar Kamprad's home produced the furniture. The founder of IKEA soon saw the opportunity of becoming a furniture provider on a larger scale and discontinued all the other products to focus directly on low-priced furniture. The result is the IKEA that we know today.

In 1953 the first IKEA furniture showroom was opened in Älmhult. In1955 IKEA began designing its own furniture. Much of IKEA's furniture was designed to be assembled by the consumer rather than being sold pre-assembled. IKEA made a revolutionary change in the interior furnishings by reducing the price of quality furnitures to a minimum amount. The successful saga took a new turn as the first IKEA store in Norway opened outside Oslo in 1963.IKEA store opened at Stockholm in 1965, in 1969 at Denmark, in 1973 at Zurich, Switzerland, in 1974 at Munich, Germany and the store opening continued as a new store opened in each succeeding years at a new country.

IKEA products vary from upholstered furniture, coffee tables, beds, carpets, lightings, and garden furnitures to a variety of household furnitures. Most of the names are Swedish, Danish, Finnish or Norwegian in origin. Although there are some notable exceptions, most product names are based on a special naming system developed by IKEA. For example, DUKTIG (good, well-behaved) is a line of children's toys, OSLO is a name of a bed, JERKER (a Swedish masculine name) is a popular desk, DINERA for tableware, KASSETT for media storage. A range of office furniture is named EFFEKTIV; ÄRPT (sharpened in Swedish) is a line of kitchen knives.

IKEA has initiated its activities in India in 2000.Together with UNICEF; IKEA initiated a broad community program in the north of India in August 2000. The aim is to prevent child labour by creating awareness and addressing the root causes. The project focuses on 200 rural communities, involving the villagers in strategies for preventing child labour.