What it is: IKEA does not run as a single company with a classic chain of command. It operates as a franchise system split across two separate company groups, each owned by its own foundation. Inter IKEA Group owns the brand and the IKEA Concept and acts as the worldwide franchisor. Ingka Group is the largest franchisee and runs most of the stores.
The key takeaway: Every IKEA retailer, including Ingka, pays Inter IKEA Systems B.V. a franchise fee of 3% of net sales for the right to use the IKEA name and product range. This deliberate separation between the brand owner and the store operators, layered on top of two non-profit foundations, is the single most important thing to understand about how IKEA is organized.
Fast facts (FY25, ended 31 August 2025): 13 groups of franchisees, more than 800 customer meeting points worldwide, EUR 44.6 billion in total IKEA retail sales, and roughly 915 million store visits.
Most write-ups describe IKEA as a tidy matrix of regional divisions reporting up to a Swedish or Dutch head office. That picture is wrong, and it is the reason so many analyses of IKEA never quite add up. The company you walk into on a Saturday afternoon is run by a franchisee. The brand on the blue building belongs to someone else. Understanding that split is the whole game.
This analysis breaks down how IKEA is actually structured in 2026, who runs which part, where the money flows, and why the founder built it this way. The figures here come from the FY25 annual reports published by Inter IKEA Group and Ingka Group in November 2025, not from older secondary summaries.
The two groups that run IKEA
IKEA was founded in Sweden in 1943 by Ingvar Kamprad. As it grew, Kamprad separated the brand from the retail operation on purpose. Today that separation is formalized into two distinct groups with different owners, different leaders, and different jobs.
| Dimension | Inter IKEA Group | Ingka Group |
|---|---|---|
| Role | Franchisor and brand owner | Largest franchisee (store operator) |
| Owns | The IKEA Concept, trademarks, range development, supply | Stores, shopping centres, investments |
| Controlling foundation | Interogo Foundation (Liechtenstein) | Stichting INGKA Foundation (Netherlands) |
| CEO (2026) | Jon Abrahamsson Ring | Juvencio Maeztu |
| FY25 revenue | EUR 26.3 billion | EUR 41.5 billion |
| Share of IKEA retail sales | Receives 3% franchise fee | 87.4% of total IKEA retail sales |
| Co-workers | Smaller, concept and supply focused | Roughly 170,000 |
Inter IKEA Group sets the strategic direction, develops the product range, runs the supply chain, and licenses the IKEA Concept to franchisees. Ingka Group takes that concept and runs it at scale, operating IKEA stores across 31 markets and generating the large majority of what customers actually spend. Two more layers, the franchise fee and the foundations, hold the whole thing together.
How the franchise model works
This is the mechanism the original framing missed entirely. IKEA stores are not branch offices reporting to a single corporate parent. They are operated under franchise agreements with Inter IKEA Systems B.V., the unit inside Inter IKEA Group that owns the IKEA Concept and the trademarks.
| Element | Detail |
|---|---|
| Franchisor | Inter IKEA Systems B.V. |
| Franchise fee | 3% of each franchisee’s net sales |
| What the fee buys | Rights to the IKEA trademarks, the IKEA Concept, and the product range |
| Number of franchisee groups (FY25) | 13 |
| Customer meeting points (FY25) | More than 800, including large stores, small stores, and pick-up points |
| Product supply | Franchisees buy inventory wholesale from Inter IKEA Group |
Money moves in two streams. Franchisees buy products wholesale from Inter IKEA Group (recorded as “sales of goods”), and they hand over 3% of net sales as a franchise fee. That is why Inter IKEA Group’s revenue and the retailers’ sales rise and fall together. When Inter IKEA cut wholesale prices by a global average of 10% across FY24 to protect affordability, its own franchise-fee income fell with it. If you want the customer-facing side of this, our breakdown of the IKEA business model walks through the revenue logic in more detail.
The dual-foundation ownership layer
Here is where IKEA gets genuinely unusual, and where most competing articles stop short. Neither group is owned by shareholders or by the Kamprad family directly. Each sits under a foundation with no beneficial owners.
| Foundation | Controls | Based in | Founded | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stichting INGKA Foundation | Ingka Group (via Ingka Holding B.V.) | Netherlands | 1982 | Reinvest profits, fund the IKEA Foundation’s charitable work |
| Interogo Foundation | Inter IKEA Group (via Inter IKEA Holding B.V.) | Liechtenstein | 1989 | Govern the IKEA Concept, hold financial reserves for the long term |
A foundation that owns a company but answers to no shareholder cannot be bought, sold, or inherited in the usual way. That is the point. The structure makes a hostile takeover practically impossible and removes the quarterly pressure that public companies face. Ingka leadership describes this plainly: the ownership model lets them “think in generations, not quarters,” which is why 85% of FY25 net profit was reinvested into the business and only 15% paid out as a dividend to the INGKA Foundation.
The Interogo side was reorganized in 2023, when a separate Inter IKEA Foundation was created to govern the IKEA businesses while Interogo focused on investments and financial reserves. The reserve fund, registered in Liechtenstein, is the cushion Kamprad reportedly called the “piggy bank” for rainy days. If you want the full ownership genealogy, see our standalone explainer on who owns IKEA.
Leadership in 2026
Both groups changed or confirmed their top leadership recently, which most older analyses do not reflect.
| Group | Leader (2026) | Role | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ingka Group | Juvencio Maeztu | CEO and President | Took over 5 November 2025, succeeding Jesper Brodin |
| Ingka Holding | Lars-Johan Jarnheimer | Chairman | Oversees the franchisee group’s board |
| Inter IKEA Group | Jon Abrahamsson Ring | CEO | Leads the franchisor and brand owner |
Juvencio Maeztu spent 25 years inside IKEA, starting as a store manager in Spain and later running IKEA India before becoming Deputy CEO. Jesper Brodin, who led Ingka for eight years and steered the omnichannel shift, stayed on through February 2026 before moving to an advisory role at the IKEA Foundation. The handover matters for any structural analysis, because the franchisee that drives nearly 90% of IKEA retail sales now reports to a new chief executive.
Inside Inter IKEA Group
The franchisor is not a marketing shell. Inter IKEA Group carries the parts of IKEA that have to be consistent everywhere: what the products are, how they are made, and how they reach stores. This shape is the result of a major 2016 restructuring that pulled range, supply, and production activities into Inter IKEA Group to clarify roles across the franchise system.
| Business inside Inter IKEA Group | Function |
|---|---|
| Inter IKEA Systems B.V. | Owns the IKEA Concept and trademarks; worldwide franchisor |
| IKEA of Sweden / Range | Develops the product range sold across all markets |
| IKEA Supply | Sources and moves products to franchisees |
| IKEA Industry | Manufactures a portion of the total range in-house |
Centralizing these functions is what keeps a Billy bookcase in Tokyo identical to one in Toronto. It also means design, sourcing, and supply decisions are made once, centrally, rather than negotiated market by market. That centralization is a genuine strength, though it concentrates a lot of strategic weight in one place.
Inside Ingka Group
Ingka Group is built around three business areas that feed each other. The retail engine drives traffic, the property arm captures the value of that traffic, and the investment arm funds long-term bets.
| Business area | What it does | FY25 signal |
|---|---|---|
| IKEA Retail | Runs the stores, pick-up points, and online channels | Roughly EUR 39 billion in sales; new touchpoints in Delhi, London, Paris |
| Ingka Centres | Owns and operates shopping centres anchored by IKEA | 320 million visits, up 18% year over year |
| Ingka Investments | Manages renewable energy, recycling, and strategic stakes | EUR 4.3 billion committed to off-site renewable energy |
This three-part shape is why Ingka behaves less like a furniture chain and more like a retail-plus-real-estate-plus-investment holding. The store sells the sofa, the centre captures the rent and footfall around it, and Investments quietly builds the energy and circular-materials base underneath. Our look at whether IKEA is profitable digs into how these pieces translate into earnings.
FY25 by the numbers
This is the Information Gain layer. These are the most recent verifiable figures, drawn from the November 2025 annual reports, and they are the data points competing structure articles have not refreshed.
| Metric (FY25, to 31 Aug 2025) | Figure | Year-over-year |
|---|---|---|
| Total IKEA retail sales | EUR 44.6 billion | Down 1.0% (down 0.3% currency adjusted) |
| Inter IKEA Group revenue | EUR 26.3 billion | Down from EUR 26.5 billion |
| Inter IKEA Group operating income | EUR 1.7 billion | Down from EUR 2.3 billion |
| Ingka Group revenue | EUR 41.5 billion | Stable |
| Ingka Group operating income | EUR 1.5 billion | Up from EUR 1.3 billion |
| Ingka Group net profit | EUR 1.4 billion | Up from EUR 0.8 billion |
| Sales volumes | Up 2.6% | Driven by FY24 price cuts |
| Store visits | About 915 million | Up 1.9% |
| New sales locations opened | 66 | Across FY25 |
Two things stand out. First, the franchisor’s profit took the harder hit: Inter IKEA Group’s net profit fell by roughly a third in FY25, squeezed by tariff uncertainty and the cost of keeping prices low for franchisees. Second, the franchisee’s profit nearly doubled. That divergence is structural, not random. Inter IKEA absorbed the affordability push at the wholesale level so retailers like Ingka could grow volume, which is exactly what the franchise design is built to allow.
Why IKEA is structured this way
The franchise-plus-foundation model is not an accident of history. It solves four problems at once.
| Goal | How the structure delivers it |
|---|---|
| Brand consistency | One franchisor controls the Concept, range, and trademarks worldwide |
| Local execution | Independent franchisees adapt operations to 31-plus markets |
| Takeover protection | Foundation ownership means no shares to buy and no family stake to sell |
| Long-term focus | Profits reinvest instead of flowing to public shareholders chasing quarterly returns |
The trade is real, though. Separating the brand owner from the store operators adds friction. Pricing, supply, and strategy have to be negotiated across two groups with different incentives, and the FY25 profit split shows how that tension plays out when costs rise. The opacity of the Liechtenstein reserve has also drawn scrutiny over the years for how little it discloses. A clear-eyed structural analysis names the cost alongside the benefit. For the wider competitive picture, our IKEA SWOT analysis and IKEA target market analysis cover where these structural choices help and where they strain.
Strengths and trade-offs at a glance
| Strengths | Trade-offs |
|---|---|
| Global brand control through a single franchisor | Coordination friction between franchisor and franchisees |
| Independence from capital markets and takeovers | Limited transparency, especially on the investment side |
| Long-term reinvestment over short-term payout | Slower, more consensus-driven decision making |
| Local adaptation across many markets | Profit pressure can land unevenly across the two groups |
Frequently asked questions
Is IKEA a franchise? Yes. Every IKEA store operates under a franchise agreement with Inter IKEA Systems B.V., the owner of the IKEA Concept. As of FY25 there were 13 groups of franchisees running more than 800 customer meeting points worldwide.
What type of organizational structure does IKEA use? A franchise structure layered on foundation ownership. The brand owner (Inter IKEA Group) and the main store operator (Ingka Group) are separate companies with separate owners, linked by a 3% franchise fee.
Who owns IKEA? No individual or public shareholder. Ingka Group is owned by the Stichting INGKA Foundation in the Netherlands, and Inter IKEA Group is controlled by the Interogo Foundation in Liechtenstein. Both are enterprise foundations without beneficial owners.
Who is the CEO of IKEA in 2026? There are two. Juvencio Maeztu leads Ingka Group, the largest franchisee, after taking over in November 2025. Jon Abrahamsson Ring leads Inter IKEA Group, the franchisor.
How much do IKEA franchisees pay? Each franchisee pays Inter IKEA Systems B.V. a fee of 3% of its net sales, plus the wholesale cost of the products it buys to stock its stores.
Bottom line
IKEA’s organizational structure is best understood as a deliberate split, not a hierarchy. Inter IKEA Group owns and protects the brand. Ingka Group and 12 other franchisee groups run the stores. Two foundations sit above both, keeping the company independent, hard to acquire, and free to think in decades. The FY25 numbers, with the franchisor’s profit falling while the largest franchisee’s profit climbed, show the model working exactly as designed: the brand owner absorbs the cost of affordability so the retailers can keep growing. Anyone analyzing IKEA who treats it as a single chain of command is analyzing a company that does not exist. To see how this structure connects to the broader strategy, pair this with our IKEA mission and vision statement and IKEA competitors breakdowns.
