Ikea to re-assemble in Halifax

Atlantic Canadians have gotten their wish, the long-awaited and much championed return of Ikea.

The Swedish furniture company announced on Friday morning it would be opening a full-size store – a 35,000 square metre, assembly-required domain – in Dartmouth Crossing.

“Ikea is thrilled to be bringing a store to the Halifax marketplace, we have for a long time, considered Halifax to be a key market for expansion,” Ikea Canada president Stefan Sjostrand told reporters, adding that construction will start this summer and is expected to be completed by next spring.

The Swedish furniture company – which shuttered its original Dartmouth location in 1988 after 13 years in business – has long held an intriguing mystique in the area, even creating a cottage industry surrounding bringing Ikea products into the province from the closest Ikea which happens to be in Montreal, more than 1,000 km away.

“There’s a guy out there who’s developed a business where he takes orders for Ikea, drives a truck or two to Montreal and Ottawa and so on, buys the stuff and brings it back, charging a fee,” says Ed Strapagiel, a retail consultant. “That’s pretty unheard of.”

But then again, there are very few places you can get similar products to Ikea.

“Ikea does a good job, they sell good stuff that appeals to consumers, different from what you can get at the usual suspects like The Brick, Leon’s and Sears,” he says. “It looks cleaner, it’s simpler and people still feel they’re saving money assembling the furniture on their own.”

Strapagiel notes that while it wasn’t explicitly stated, Ikea likely left Atlantic Canada in the 1980s as it “just wasn’t a big enough market.”

“I think they were hoping for more of a regional market in Halifax but it just didn’t happen – Halifax’s population is under 400,000 which is a drop in the bucket really (for Ikea),” he says. “At one time Ikea says it was only targeting markets of a million plus.”

As to why now, he says a lot of it has to do with the changes that have taken place since the company closed down its Dartmouth store.

“The big one is the Internet,” he says explaining that Ikea has developed a greater reach with online catalogues and a new string of pick-up depots where customers can order their products and go pick them up. “Over the last couple of years, Ikea has developed its pick-up depot concept – that combines very well with the Internet so you can get and see everything online.”

The brand has had a strong run as of late, reporting Canadian sales climbed more than 10 per cent to $1.79 billion and online sales shot up over 40 per cent to $103 million in the 2014-15 fiscal year ending Aug. 31. The company has had stores in Canada for over 40 years.

“It’s the leading furniture store in Canada,” says Strapagiel. “Ikea really hasn’t lost its mystique.”