Ikea to Expand Central Texas Store

October 11, 2011  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in Furniture Retailing on October 12, 2011

Swedish home furnishings retail giant Ikea will expand its Central Texas store in Round Rock.

Ikea Round Rock, which opened November 2006 with 252,000 square feet, will add almost 54,000 square feet for a total of  approximately 306,000 square feet. Construction will begin this month, with an expected completion in Summer 2012. The store will remain open and operational during construction, maintaining its product offering.

The project will include extending the self-serve furniture area (where shoppers collect flat-packed furniture to take home on the same day), relocating customer service functions to the newly built part of the store, and constructing a three-level parking structure to offset spaces eliminated by converting the northwest section of the parking lot into building. In the end, there still will be approximately 1,200 parking spaces available on site.

"IKEA is thrilled with the success of IKEA Round Rock," said Store Manager Gerd Diewald. "But, as its customer base and sales continue to grow--along with the product assortment we offer--the size of the store's warehouse capacity now is less than ideal. Extending the store's self-serve furniture area so it can hold more products will allow us to improve the shopping experience, to meet our customers' needs more easily, and to enhance our ability to keep lowering prices."

Increased goods availability and the opportunity for the store to inventory more stock will result in transport savings continually passed on to customers.