IKEA Saudi Arabia and its first store

Ghassan Ahmed Al Sulaiman Furnishing Co. Ltd, which is an IKEA franchise in Saudi Arabia, extended its warmest wishes to the people of Sweden on the occasion of the Swedish National Day.
In a press release yesterday, it went into details about the first IKEA store that was opened in late 1983 covering an area of 500 square meter, to meet the market demand. In 1985, it said, the original Jeddah IKEA store was opened covering an area of 7,000 square meter, besides a 10,000 square meter separate warehouse.
The Riyadh IKEA store and external warehouse was opened in 1990 covering an area of 6,000 square meter each.
In 2004, the IKEA relocated by closing down the existing stores and opening two IKEA concept stores covering the area of 28,000 square meter each, staffed with a total strength of 290 co-workers.
The third IKEA store in Saudi Arabia opened in November 2008 on the east coast in Dhahran city. The store covered an area of 23,000 square meter and was staffed with 245 co-workers.
"Today we have over 1200 coworkers in a diverse multicultural environment with almost 60 percent Saudi," the press statement said.