IKEA to open second store in Navi Mumbai in 2019; will create 10,000 jobs in Maharashtra over next 3 years

Swedish furniture giant IKEA, which launched its first store in Hyderabad in August, will soon be opening its second store in Navi Mumbai in Maharashtra in less than a year where it plans to hire 1,000 people. The company is looking to hire people in e-commerce, sales, logistics, digital and Human Resource and most of them will comprise of locals, a senior company executive said. IKEA employs 1,000 people in its Hyderabad store. Over a 3-year period, the company plans to create 10,000 jobs. “We are planning to recruit 5,000 directly and an equal number will be hired indirectly over the two to three years,” IKEA India’s people and culture manager Anna-Carin Mansson told Firstpost. This will include directly hiring 1,000 people by mid-next year and 1,500 indirectly for services, including assembly among others, she said. From the start, the company has been focussed on hiring 50 percent women co-workers in its stores at all levels. In keeping with that commitment, 50 percent of the recruitment at the Navi Mumbai store will comprise of women. “We are also open for recruiting from the lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) communities,” she added. The company is expecting to keep attrition levels low, with ’employer-friendly’ policies, which include daycare facilities, parental leave policy, transport policy, competence development, mentoring, pension plan among others. [caption id=“attachment_590836” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representative image. Reuters[/caption] Since 2017, IKEA Foundation, IKEA Group’s philanthropic arm, in partnership with United Nations Development Program and India Development Foundation, has begun training women for a career in the retail sector. The program under Disha for women in Telangana has placed around 80 women in its store in Hyderabad. “The aim is to train around a million underprivileged women along with other partners,” said Mansson. “Maharashtra is an important market for us. We have been sourcing from the state for many decades and now we are ready to enter the market in 2019 with our full offer to be able to serve all the customers,” IKEA India market manager for Maharashtra Per Hornell said.

With the potential the company sees for its products in Mumbai, Mansson said IKEA plans to penetrate the entire city with all kinds of store formats – inside malls, single store units and also online. “We will have a unique IKEA in Mumbai. After the launch of the Navi Mumbai store, we will be available online. Customers may look at products from the store and then order online,” Mansson said. The smaller format stores will open six months after the launch of the store in Navi Mumbai.

Rajesh Kumar, Principal Secretary, Labour Department, Government of Maharashtra said, “As IKEA will launch its store in Mumbai next year, they will create around 10,000 direct and indirect job opportunities contributing to the growth of the retail sector in the State. Their idea of inclusion and equality are very much in line with Maharashtra government’s development initiatives,” he said.

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IKEA is the first major single-brand retailer to get FDI approval and plans to open several stores and multiple touch points across the main cities over the next 10 years. Ikea has four land sites in Telangana, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Delhi/NCR, and continues to look for more in other major cities. It operates 423 IKEA stores in 50 countries with a sales volume of 38.3 billion euros. Currently, its biggest market is Germany with 54 stores. We envisage India and hope India gets to as big as that. It will take some time though," admitted Mansson. –With PTI inputs