World's leading home furnishings retailer IKEA will open its second store in the country at Navi Mumbai on December 18.
The over five lakh sq ft store would be the second store for IKEA in India after Hyderabad, where it had opened its first store in August 2018.
In a bid to provide a safe shopping experience during COVID times, the Swedish retailer is taking extra precautions for its new store located on the Thane-Belapur Road, a company statement said.
IKEA said it is taking a number of extra precautions from its global best practices and relevant learnings from its Hyderabad operations.
Moreover, to ensure good social distancing, IKEA will initially have a cap on the number of visitors to the store through prior registration on its website, by which customers will be allotted a day and time slot to visit the store.
"We are very excited, as Mumbai is one of our priority markets in India. We have been present online in Mumbai since early 2019 and soon the many people of Mumbai will be able to shop at our fantastic IKEA store," IKEA India CEO & Chief Sustainability Officer Peter Betzel said.
The store in Navi Mumbai will be employing close to 1,200 coworkers out of which 50 per cent are women. 40 per cent of its staff are from the Navi Mumbai area and 70 per cent of its support staff - mainly housekeeping and security are from in and around Turbhe and Ghansoli, the statement added.
"With our long-term commitment to Maharashtra we will create 6000+ jobs by 2030 of which 50 per cent will be women," Betzel said.
"IKEA's further expansion with its Navi Mumbai store will create a positive impact in many ways - growing the home furnishings retail and manufacturing sector, creating more jobs, skill development and logistical development in the state. The local community will highly benefit from IKEA's presence. Welcome to Maharashtra," Maharashtra Industry Minister Subhash Desai added.
IKEA India, part of Ingka Group opened its first retail store in Hyderabad in August 2018, followed by online stores in Mumbai, Hyderabad and Pune in 2019 as part of its multichannel approach.
Ingka Group is a strategic partner in the IKEA franchise system, operating 378 IKEA stores in 30 countries. Ingka Group has three business areas: IKEA Retail, Ingka Investments and Ingka Centres.
