Furniture giant Ikea has defied the retail gloom by posting a hike in annual sales - and it says it's been helped by customers going green.
The Swedish group said British sales jumped 8% to £2.1bn in the year to August 31, with its share of the home furnishings market rising from 8.4% to 9%.
Ikea credited growing demand for green products for some of that success, with customers looking to reduce waste. It reported a 127% rise in the sale of lunchboxes, as well as a 55% rise in sales of reusable water bottles and a 15% increase in sales of recycling bins.
Ikea has 22 stores and employs 11,181 staff in the UK. Earlier this year it opened a new store in Greenwich that employs 500.
That store is also Ikea UK’s first “sustainable” store, which uses geothermal heating and solar power.
The company said it was also helped by a surge in online sales, which now account for 19% of all sales. Its saw 224 million visits to its website over the year.
Ikea has also been growing its home delivery service. It aims to offer 24-hour delivery in London, and two-day delivery across the rest of the UK, by the end of the year - and has opened two customer delivery centres in the capital to drive that forward.
Ikea has been undergoing a global restructure, with 350 jobs going in the UK.
Peter Jelkeby, Ikea country retail manager for the UK and Ireland, said: "Despite a challenging retail environment, Ikea has seen another year of strong sales growth as we continue the transformation of our business.
"We know that people's shopping habits and expectations are changing, so continued investments in our shopping experience, our people and in adapting our operations to ensure we become a fully circular business by 2030, will be vital to secure the success of our business in the future."
Worldwide, Ikea - whose UK base is in Milton Keynes - saw retail sales rise 5% over the year.
