The IKEA Bengaluru 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.
“Namaskara Bengaluru! We are ready to welcome you to our new home. Manege banni. Explore 7000+ home furnishing solutions, delicious Swe-desi cuisine and a lot more at IKEA Nagasandra store," the Swedish retail giant said in a tweet.
IKEA also said that it has arranged extra parking at BIEC-10th Mile, Tumkur Road till 3rd July.
IKEA had opened its first Indian store in Hyderabad in 2019, followed by its Navi Mumbai store in December 2020. Later, the Swedish home furnishing retailer opened another store in Worli, Mumbai.
The 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.
The Karnataka chief minister said IKEA has decided to invest about ₹3,000 crore in Karnataka. IKEA is expecting to attract close to five million visitors this year at its Bengaluru, store.
According to the company, IKEA has employed 1,000 co-workers with 72 per cent local co-workers and plans to hire more people from the local neighbourhood.
"I have requested them to ramp it (job opportunities) up. Each outlet provides employment opportunities for about 1,000 persons. I have also asked them to open more outlets in Bengaluru, including one in south Bengaluru, as the city has the potential for more," the chief minister said.
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.
"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. (With Agency Inputs)
