Going as planned, IKEA says

By Aimee Chanthadavong

Swedish furnishing retailer IKEA has announced that its Springvale store in Melbourne is on track for an early September opening.

Speaking to Retailbiz, Jude Leon, IKEA spokesperson, said the store construction is progressing well.

“We are on track for a September opening now that the blue cladding has started to be put in place. It’s really starting to look like an IKEA store,” she said.

The Springvale store will measure 32,000 square metres and is a joint development with Harvey Norman, expected to be worth $300 million.

“We don’t have a lot of going contact with the Harvey Norman team but we are looking forward to being alongside them and becoming one of the large home maker centres in Australia,” Leon said.

The store construction is part of the company’s plan of expanding its retail footprint in Australia with another IKEA store scheduled to open in Tempe, Sydney in October.

Currently, IKEA has three existing stores and is expected that a total of seven stores will be opened across Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney by 2015.