Ikea sales rise to £1.8 billion in the UK

The 5.8% sales rise for the Swedish group's British operation over the last 12 months sets the seal of a 57% sales rise over the last six years.

Over the last year 57.2 million people visited its UK stores, including its giant site beside the M6 at Wednesbury.

Ikea says it continues to outperform the market in home-furnishings, increasing its market share by 0.5%, bringing the retailer one step closer to the ambition of increasing overall market share to 15% by 2027.

Gillian Drakeford, Ikea's UK retail manager, said: “As we celebrate our 30th anniversary this year, we remain committed to the UK and are proud to have achieved another successful year of growth. This is testament to the talent of our co-workers and our ambition to inspire customers with the best possible experience.”

Ikea has continued to open new stores, at Reading and Sheffield, with two more planned in Exeter and Greenwich in the coming year. At the same time a new website helped boost online sales by 10%, now accounting for 15% of total UK sales.

Gillian Drakeford added: “We have ambitious expansion plans for the UK and are committed to making Ikea more accessible to the many people. As well as opening new stores, we are also enhancing existing stores.

"Half way through the year we refurbished all living room departments in preparation for this year’s ‘Make Room for Life’ campaign and we are already seeing a great response to this. We also rebuilt many of our self-serve areas by creating wider aisles so that it’s a safer and more pleasant shopping experience for customers.

“In addition to our global acquisition of TaskRabbit, we also launched Click and Collect in all Order and Collection points.”

Ikea says it created 1,000 new jobs last year, bringing its total number of UK workers to 10,900.