Ingvar Kamprad was born in the village of Pjätterydnear, near Agunnaryd, on March 20, 1926. He was a tough upbringing: Sweden in the late 1920s and early 1930s was difficult place in which to grow up.
By the time he was ten years old he was already running a business buying matches wholesale in Stockholm and reselling them to neighbors in the village at a tidy profit. He realized that, if he bought them wholesale in Stockholm, he could sell them to his neighbors at a price that was considered cheap and still make a healthy profit.
He later involved in the importation and sale of pens and office equipment and created his own company at the age of seventeen, before entering the business school in Göteborg.
When Kamprad was 17, in 1943, his father gave him a sum of money as a reward for his school performance, and he used this to set up a business he called IKEA.
His business had outgrown local delivery and he began to sell by mail order. Newspaper advertisements stimulated demand, and the local milk cart and train network solved his distribution problems.
Furniture from local producers was introduced in 1948, and in 1951 the now iconic catalogue appeared.
In 1953 he opened his first showroom, offering his customers the opportunity to buy quality locally made furniture at prices below those of his competitors. Later Swedish furniture makers union boycotted Ingvar Kamprad and he was forced to have his furniture made in Poland.
Over the 1970s, and 1980s the company expanded across Europe; in 1985, it opened its first store in Philadelphia; and in 1987 it was in the UK.
By 2012, there were over 150,000 employees and more than 300 stores throughout the developed world.
Ingvar Kamprad – the founder of IKEA
