6 Disappointing Things You Didn’t Know About Ikea

From illegal activities to unethical business practices.

IKEA is a furniture brand — not Greek to us. The Swedish giant is the world’s largest furniture retailer selling goods worth billions of dollars, making it highly probable that you own one of its piece. Perhaps, the couch you are sitting on is a couch that is an Ikea couch.

With nearly 800 million customers that visit the stores each year, Ikea’s massive stores are kept well-stocked thanks to its workforce of 194,000 employees.

There is a lot to love about Ikea, whether its furniture or its delicious cafeteria food, everything combined gives us one of the best shopping experiences.

But beyond all those bright and shiny showrooms, there is a dark side that no amount of light can fix — from the massive wood consumption till their ties with the Nazis.

Interestingly, Ikea has done an outstanding job of hiding their past behind their immense success yet here we are.

1. Founder’s Ties With The Nazis

The founder of Ikea, Ingvar Kamprad, admitted in 1994 to having ties with the pro-Nazi and swedish Nazi party in the 1940s and 50s.

Ingvar denied the allegations and even denied being a former member of any Nazi party.

Still, years later, more evidence surfaced about his connections with the Nazis, which was not good for him and the company (Ikea).

Ingvar Kamprad had an apologetic approach to this, describing the ties as the biggest mistake of his life.

Regretting this immature sin, Ingvar apologized from all the parties and people who were offended by his actions.

Ingvar stated that Ikea is unsullied and has nothing to do with Racism or Nazism. Apparently, the public bought this statement of his as the company had profits of nearly 3 billion dollars in the year 2017.

2. Use Of Slave Labour

Ikea, a company which sells furniture and other goodies for homes, have a price that many can afford, and these competitive prices are one of the reasons for Ikea’s massive sales.

But! Ikea took this competitiveness to a whole different level. An audit in 2012 unveiled another scandal.

The audit found that Ikea was using prisoners in East Germany to produce their products from the 1960s to the 1980s — all these products were made without any compensation.

Ikea funded the audit, and the company released the audit statement too. But sadly, nothing can justify their act of knowingly using slaves to make extra profit. It is wrong, like terrible.

3. Ikea’s Tax Evasion Was Only Left

After connections with Nazis and later slavery, the only thing left for Ikea to do was to evade taxes, which it did, and in the modern world, tax evasion is not only a crime, but it is also a crime hated the most by the public.

Recent tax evasion of Ikea has not helped the company’s reputation. Ikea is a part of a complex corporate structure with several companies, but Ikea being the famous one is often the one to blame.

To avoid being taxed, the company funnelled the money through its sister company in the Netherlands, and then that money was moved all over Europe’s tax havens.

It is estimated that Ikea has avoided paying more than One Billion Euros in taxes over the years.

4. Controversial Cafeteria Of Ikea

Ikea introduced cafeterias in their store because of Ingvar Kamprad’s concerns — too many customers searched Ikea’s shelves for their desired products while having an empty stomach.

Ingvar couldn’t see his customers leaving the store for the nearest fast food joint without making any purchase.

Ikea can dish out more than 150 million meatballs a year from its cafeteria, and if Ikea only sold food, it would still be among the world’s largest retailers.

In the fiscal years 2016 and 2017, Ikea recorded sales of more than 2 billion US Dollars just from food, and that is a lot of meatballs and buns if you ask me

Ikea food initiative was hit hard in 2013 when inspectors found traces of horse meat in their frozen meatballs — this horse meat incident wasn’t just limited to Ikea.

Sadly, it swept the whole of Europe. But Ikea’s swift response took hold of the situation. Ikea withdrew its Swedish meatballs from its cafeteria and markets all over Europe.

5. Illegal Logging For Furniture Manufacturing

Ikea has faced many allegations since it started expanding and becoming a well-known giant. One of the allegations that Ikea faces is related to illegal logging.

Ikea has been selling furniture made from illegal logging in protected forests of Romania, Ukraine and Russia.

Ikea uses 1% of all the lumber produced worldwide, but recently the company revamped its policy regarding wood, and is committed to getting 100% sustainable wood sources.

6. Surveillance Or Survey A Bit Confusing Approach

Ikea is always striving to build a great product, and to build these kinds of items, lots of research and development work is required, and in 2015 Ikea took things to the next level.

Ikea placed cameras in volunteers’ homes to study their behaviour and habits at home, raising questions regarding ethical business. This research was carried out in Shenzhen, China, New York, the USA, Milan, and other cities.

Final Words

Ikea is a company that is often considered one of the leading retailers across the world.

The company has seen many rough patches on its way to being a billion-dollar firm. With a bit of policy restructuring, it can get over these image hurting hurdles once and forever.

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