Abstract
Globalization is today part of most companies. If they want to become more influent, they have to enter new markets and open new subsidiaries. But for this, they have to study the market well that they want to enter because there can be some economical, political and cultural differences. This can fail some partnerships or ventures if some aspects are not taken into account.
To be successful, these companies have to support their brands by intensive advertising campaigns, some constantly renewed products and attractive packaging. It is the only means to impose a distinct brand image and make the customers faithful.
IKEA, the world's largest home furnishing retailer, is however still unknown in some locations and has to consider the different barriers it can have to face and see how it could handle with them to enter these markets.
We will in the first part make a presentation of the company, then we will study what the issues were due to cultural differences that IKEA had to face and in the third part, some possible recommendations and the five dimensions of Hofstede.
The IKEA Group is one of the largest home furnishing companies in the world. The company offers a wide range of well-designed, functional home furnishing products at low prices so that nearly everybody can be able to afford them. IKEAS's motto is "Affordable solutions for better living".
The acronym IKEA comes from the initials of the founder's name (Ingvar Kamprad), the farm where he grew up (Elmtaryd) and his home village (Agunnaryd).
The company was founded in 1943 by Ingvar Kamprad. It originally sold only pens, watches, jewelry, picture frames and so on. He added furniture to the range in 1947 and some personal designed ones in 1955.
The company has today 264 stores worldwide, in more than 44 countries, in Europe, North America and Asia. 21 new stores should be opened before the end of the year in 11 countries. It is also one of the only international companies to have opened stores in Israel and some Southwest Asia Nations.
