Swedish multinational Ikea has announced an ambitious 90 million euro investment plan to boost its logistics in Spain. With 22% of its turnover in Spain coming from online sales, the company has decided to invest in a network of operations centres to help to improve delivery times and reduce costs, while at the same time reducing the associated emissions.

The star of this investment plan is the opening of a new logistics centre in Antequera (Malaga), to which it will allocate 60 million euros. San Sebastián de los Reyes (Madrid) will also get a new logistics centre, which represents an investment of 20 million euros. A third warehouse, in Illescas (Toledo), started operating in March. The logistics capacity of the Ikea stores will also be increased, and some of them will be used as regional logistics centres - as is currently the case with the one in Jerez (Cadiz).

Regional logistics unit
When it opens for business at the end of 2024, the Antequera centre will operate as a regional logistics unit that will handle both online and in-store orders, as well as delivering them to customers' homes throughout Andalusia. Specialising in furniture and other bulky items, the 32,500 square metre site is expected to handle around 400,000 orders a year.

This investment goes to show how Andalusia is a strategic market for Ikea, which has also prioritised this region in its plan for opening future physical stores. The company plans to open twelve points of sale with different formats and sizes and 32 collection points this year.

Job creation
Investments in the logistics capacity building plan will generate a total of 450 new direct jobs, part of the 1,500 jobs that Ikea expects to create by the end of 2024. 25% of the company's employees currently work on logistics and order picking tasks.

Kristien Nuyts, country customer fulfilment manager and member of Ikea's Board of Directors in Spain, explained, “Our business is continuing to experience strong growth, also in terms of online sales, and we will be opening new customer touchpoints, so our logistics capabilities must increase accordingly, and this translates into major plans for our presence and operations in Spain”.

As part of these plans, Nuyts sees the need to find new ways of operating, asserting that, “According to our calculations, this transformation will enable us to deliver to 80% of the population in Spain within a maximum of 48 hours”. “We have big plans for Spain”, she concluded.

^{Photo: Ikea}