November 2021: Ingka Group News

• This Green Friday IKEA encouraged customers to save more than money
• Ingka Group reported solid growth and accelerated investments
• IKEA increases action to enable people to live a more sustainable life at home
• Ingka Investments made minority investments in Bolt Logistics and sustainable logistics company Urb-it
• COP26 engagement: ‘Assembling our Future’ exhibition and OHOP
• Global diversity and inclusion survey launched by Ingka Group
• Ingka Centres launched its first IKEA anchored meeting place in India

This Green Friday IKEA encouraged customers to save more than money

Ingka Group (IKEA Retail) drove its new month-long Green Friday campaign building on the success of last year. IKEA stores in 32 countries encouraged people to save more than money, by asking customers to bring back their preloved IKEA products in return for a voucher to spend when they really need something. In addition to taking back furniture, customers are offered the chance to choose pre-loved items when shopping at IKEA, both online and in store.

With Green Friday, Ingka Group wants to show people that taking positive steps towards a more sustainable life can be affordable and convenient. Giving used items a second life and buying pre-loved products are just some measures to take to lower our climate footprint.

Ingka Group reported solid growth and accelerated investments

After another disruptive year, Ingka Group reported total revenue of EUR 39.8 billion in FY21 across its three business areas (IKEA Retail, Ingka Investments and Ingka Centres) and a EUR 1.6 billion net profit.

“The past year kept challenging us in many ways, but thanks to the remarkable efforts and entrepreneurship of our co-workers, we have delivered solid growth, continued our business transformation, and responded to our customers’ increasing needs at home,” said Juvencio Maeztu, Deputy CEO and CFO Ingka Group (IKEA).

Despite the challenges presented by the pandemic, the company has continued to accelerate investments in being more accessible, more affordable, and sustainable to better meet the changing needs and dreams of its customers.

IKEA increases action to enable people to live a more sustainable life at home

According to research by Ingka Group, the biggest barriers that prevent people from taking individual action on climate change are – not getting enough support from governments and businesses, that climate action is too expensive, and not knowing what to do.

As one answer to this, Ingka Group has been implementing a new Sustainable Living Shop across its 32 markets to inspire and enable customers to live a more sustainable life at home. The dedicated space in the store focuses on highlighting accessible and affordable products and solutions among the existing IKEA range that will support people to take small steps and reduce their climate impact and household costs by using less energy, reducing single use, creating less waste, using less water and caring, repairing, reselling and recycling.

Ingka Investments made minority investments in Bolt Logistics and sustainable logistics company Urb-it

Ingka Investments has made a minority investment in Urb-it, a Swedish sustainable logistics platform that provides last-mile deliveries across Europe. Urb-it is committed to standards of social and environmental performance. Delivering the last mile exclusively on foot, bike or with its e-cargo-bike fleet, the Nasdaq Nordic listed company aims to reduce air pollution, noise pollution and congestion in urban areas, thus bring real, sustainable change.

Earlier this month, Ingka Investments made a minority investment in Bolt Logistics, a Canadian technology-enabled logistics and last-mile delivery provider. Bolt Logistics (“Bolt”) is managing everything from small items to heavy-and-hard-to-handle fulfillment deliveries and has established itself as an industry leader with its technology driven and sustainable approach to logistics.

Through investments, Ingka Group strengthens its long-term growth, secures its financial position, and supports the sustainability goals by making responsible investments in people and innovative businesses.

COP26 engagement: ‘Assembling our Future’ exhibition and OHOP

Ingka Group joined forces with London based creative studio Superflux to present a message of optimism and a call to action in an exhibition inside The New York Times Climate Hub during COP26, the United Nations Climate Conference taking place in Glasgow, UK.

The exhibition ‘Assembling our Future’ showcased how IKEA accelerates climate action with partners across the value chain and demonstrated that many of the climate solutions needed already exist. Visitors could explore and learn about how AI is used to reduce food waste in IKEA restaurants, how IKEA provides solutions to reduce energy use at home, how sustainable materials are sourced and used and how electric vehicles deliver IKEA goods.

As part of its participation and engagement at COP26, Ingka Group also hosted its third edition of One Home One Planet, at The New York Times Climate Hub in Glasgow. One Home One Planet is an action-orientated sustainability event, that brings together purpose-driven, ideas-led doers, thinkers and influencers from across different sectors. Together with IKEA, they work to break down barriers to solving key social and environmental challenges facing the world – challenges that, more than ever, need urgent attention.

Global diversity and inclusion survey launched by Ingka Group

Last week, Ingka Group launched a global diversity and inclusion co-worker survey to provide insights that will support Ingka Group to create even more equal, diverse and inclusive workplaces.

“We’re proud of our achievements to date, but there’s still work to do in reflecting the diversity of our many customers and in ensuring all co-workers feel included,” says Helen Duphorn, Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Manager at Ingka Group. “We want to be an even more diverse and inclusive workplace regardless of identities, backgrounds or abilities, so we need to get more insights to have positive impact, and we have invited all co-workers to take part.”

The survey named Ingka Includes is voluntary and anonymous and aims to help Ingka Group to know what it is doing well and where it can improve by gathering more knowledge on the total diversity situation across Ingka Group’s markets and operations.

Ingka Centres launched its first IKEA anchored meeting place in India

Ingka Centres, part of the Ingka Group, has revealed plans for a major new IKEA anchored mixed-use development in Gurugram, a city in the state of Haryana, southwest of New Delhi.

Reflecting the local community’s need for more than shopping, the new meeting place will set the standard for the next generation of sustainable mixed-use destinations, acting as a lively gathering place for leisure, entertainment and retail in one of the world’s fastest growing markets. While construction will start in early 2022, the new meeting place is expected to generate more than 2500 jobs and will contribute to further growth of organised retail in India.