IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad dead at 91
IKEA founder Ingvar Kamprad died in his sleep at his home in Småland, southern Sweden, the company has announced. He was 91. Since the 1970s, Kamprad, who founded the furniture giant when he was 17, had been living in Denmark and Switzerland, but returned to Sweden in 2013 after his wife's death. The Kamprad family is one of Europe's richest.
IKEA takes to Twitter to announce the death
Kamprad's stint with one of the world's largest retailers
Kamprad, born in 1926 in Smålandand, sold matches, seeds and pens when he was five. At 17, he started IKEA as a shop in his garden shed, but it was 1956 when it pioneered its signature flat-pack furniture. Since 1998, he wasn't involved in a managerial role, but assisted as advisor. In 2013, he quit the board of the company that owns the brand.
The "aha" moment that led to IKEA's signature furniture
The idea for the flat-pack furniture of IKEA - a combination of the initials of his name, the family farm Elmtaryd and the nearby village Agunnaryd - was born when Kamprad saw an employee taking off a table's legs to fit it into a customer's car. That was when he realized saving space meant saving money. The retailer is today heading for $62bn in annual revenues.
Kamprad's frugality helped build Brand IKEA, he claimed
Kamprad was known for his frugality. He bought clothes at flea markets and scheduled haircuts only when in developing countries. In 2008, he told media a €22 bill in the Netherlands had crossed his haircut budget. He left Sweden to flee its high tax rate and moved to Denmark before shifting to Switzerland. "I want to set a good example," he had said.
