IKEA Report - Business Consultants - Group M4
             As a group of business consultants we were asked to assist IKEA with the development of their strategy, the following are our written findings.
             This report is focused on three main areas:
             v Identifying the key factors that have led to IKEA's success to date
             v Analysing the company's organisational culture in relation to their business model
             v Evaluating the strategic capabilities that the company should build upon for the future.
             Part One: Identifying the key factors that have led to IKEA's success to date
             In Identifying the major causes of success for IKEA, many issues and factors were discussed.
             We identified the 5 Critical success factors that all companies compete on to some extent but also took note of some of the other factors that have contributed to IKEA's success.
             The first of the CSF's that we're going to look at is Cost.
             Core Belief: IKEA's success, to a large degree has been shaped by the company's founder Ingvar Kamprad. He held a strong personal belief that if the furniture he sold was of a high quality and low enough in price then people would buy lots of it, and this certainly proved to be right.
             Cost Leadership: Kamprad was a keen believer in cost leadership, this meant cutting costs in any way possible, this was achieved in two main ways:
             Simple Methods: Firstly, to keep costs low IKEA used simple methods and didn't try to overcomplicate anything. Kamprad started looking for new ways in which to cut costs, in the hope of being able to pass the savings on to his customers. Kamprad emphasized a commonsense approach to business
             Bulk Buying: Kamprad realised that buying in bulk was a good way of saving costs; this meant that if he was producing the furniture at a lower cost, he could afford to lower the cost that he was charging to the customers and still make a tidy profit in the mean time. In doing this, IKEA's prices were 30-50% low...