IKEA would still like to return to doing business in Russia

Despite the store’s relatively small showroom, some shoppers have welcomed its arrival after more than a year without access to IKEA products. “Nice beginning of the return of the things we miss,” one customer told Reuters. “We hope that there will be more items on sale.”

Swed House plans to start with five stores in Moscow before expanding to other Russian cities next year.

Last June, IKEA owner Ingka Holding said it hopes to resume business in Russia sometime in the future. In August, a source close to IKEA told Russian news agency TASS that the furniture maker plans to return to Russia “within a year to two,” amid rising pressure to sell its three factories to local owners. IKEA maintains that it is “not going to sell its business in Russia.”

In 2021, Russia accounted for 4%, or $1.8 billion, of IKEA’s earnings from retail sales, making the country its 10th-biggest market in the 31 countries where it operated that year.

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