Feodor Ingvar Kamprad (30 March 1926 – 27 January 2018)[3] was a Swedish billionaire businessman who founded IKEA in 1943 and grew it into a multinational retail company that became the world's largest furniture seller in 2008. He moved to Switzerland with his Swiss wife in 1976, moving back to Småland in 2014 after her death in 2011.
Early life and family
Kamprad was born in Pjätteryd (now part of Älmhult Municipality), Kronobergs län, in Småland, Sweden, to Feodor Kamprad (1893–1984) and Berta Linnea Matilda Nilsson (1901–1956). His mother was of Swedish origin, while his father was born in the German Empire and came to Sweden a year after his birth with his parents. Kamprad's paternal grandfather, Achim Erdmann Kamprad, was originally from an aristocratic German family in Altenburger Land in Thuringia, while his paternal grandmother, Franzisca ("Fanny") Glatz, was born in Radonitz (Radonice) in Bohemia in the Austro-Hungarian Empire to a lower-class family. Facing rejection from his family and economic hardship in post-industrial Germany are likely what spurred Achim and Franzisca to leave their homeland and, after seeing an ad in a hunting magazine, purchase a timber estate near Agunnaryd, Sweden, where they moved with their young children in the winter of 1896.[4][5]
The surname Kamprad is a variant of "Kamerade" ("Comrade") and dates back to the 14th century; in the 19th century the Kamprad family had become wealthy estate owners in Thuringia. Achim Kamprad's mother was a distant relative of Paul von Hindenburg.[6] Achim was the younger son of an estate owner and had bought the farm Elmtaryd (presently standardized Älmtaryd) near the small village of Agunnaryd (now part of Ljungby Municipality) in the province of Småland; with 449 ha of land it was the largest farm in the area. He took his own life a few years after Frans Feodor was born, leaving the farm to Franzisca, and with time, to Franz Feodor. From the age of 6 onwards, Ingvar Kamprad lived on the farm with his parents, sister, and grandmother.[7]
Kamprad visited his family's ancestral town in Thuringia and kept in contact with relatives there.[8]
Career
Kamprad began to develop a business as a young boy. He started selling matches at the age of five.[9] When he was seven he began travelling further afield on his bicycle to peddle to neighbours. He found he could buy matches in bulk very cheaply in Stockholm, sell them individually at a low price, and still make a good profit. From matches he expanded to selling fish, Christmas tree decorations, seeds, and later ballpoint pens and pencils.[9] When Kamprad was 17, his father gave him a cash reward for succeeding in his studies.[10]
Ingvar attended Gothenburg's Handelsinstitut, now part of Hvitfeldtska Gymnasiet, from 1943 to 1945. In 1943, when he was 17 Kamprad founded IKEA at his uncle Ernst's kitchen table.[11] In 1948, Kamprad diversified his portfolio, adding furniture. His business was mostly mail order.[11]
Net worth and Stichting INGKA Foundation
The Dutch-registered Stichting INGKA Foundation is named after Ingvar Kamprad (i.e., ING + KA) which owns INGKA Holding, the parent company for all IKEA stores. Kamprad was chairman of the foundation.
According to an article in the Swedish business weekly Veckans Affärer in 2004, Kamprad was one of the world's wealthiest people.[14] However, the report was based on the assumption that he owned the entire company, an approach both IKEA and the Kamprad family rejected since Kamprad retained little direct ownership in the company, having transferred his interest to the foundation.[15]
In March 2010, Forbes magazine estimated Kamprad's fortune at US$23 billion, making him the eleventh richest person in the world. A year later, he fell to 162nd after his lawyers produced documents proving that the foundation he established and heads in Liechtenstein owns IKEA, and that its bylaws bar him and his family from benefiting from its funds. In June 2015, Kamprad was listed as the eighth wealthiest person in the world in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, with an estimated net worth of $58.7 billion. Forbes reported Kamprad's net worth as of March 2015 to be $3.5 billion.[16]
Works
While generally a private person, Kamprad published a few notable works. He first detailed his philosophies of frugality and simplicity in a manifesto entitled A Testament of a Furniture Dealer in 1976.[17]
Kamprad also worked with Swedish journalist Bertil Torekull on Leading by Design: The IKEA Story. In the autobiographical book, Kamprad further describes his philosophies and the trials and triumphs of the founding of IKEA.[18]
Fascist involvement
In 1994, the personal letters of the Swedish fascist Per Engdahl were made public, posthumously revealing that Kamprad had joined Engdahl's pro-fascist New Swedish Movement (Nysvenska Rörelsen) in 1942, at age 16.[15][19] Kamprad had been active till as late as September 1945.[15] When he quit the group is unknown, but he remained a friend of Engdahl until the early 1950s.[20]
Kamprad devoted two chapters to his time in Nysvenska Rörelsen in his book Leading by Design: The IKEA Story and, in a 1994 letter to IKEA employees, called his affiliation with the organization the "greatest mistake of my life".[10] Kamprad explained his teenage engagement in New Swedish Movement as being politically influenced by his father and grandmother in Sudet-Germany.[21]
Personal life
Kamprad and his first wife Kerstin Wadling adopted a daughter, Annika in 1958.[1] Wadling and Kamprad divorced in 1961 with Annika living with her mother.[24]
In the 1960s, Kamprad married his second wife, Margaretha Kamprad-Stennert (1938–2011), whom he met when she was twenty years old.[25] They had three sons: Peter, Jonas and Mathias.[26][27][28]
Kamprad lived in Épalinges in Canton Vaud in Switzerland, from 1976 to 2014. He moved back to Småland in Sweden in March 2014 after nearly forty years absence.
Death
Kamprad died in his sleep of pneumonia at his home in Småland, Sweden, on 27 January 2018 at the age of 91.[36][37][38]
According to his will, half of Kamprad's estate would go to projects in Norrland, the sparsely populated northern half of Sweden.[39] Kamprad reportedly wanted to develop Norrland and make it possible for young people to live there.[39]
The other half of his estate went to his four children.[40] In 2015, it was reported that Kamprad had named his sons as the sole heirs of an entity called the Ikano
See also
- The World's Billionaires
External links
- Ingvar Kamprad, Founder of Ikea and Creator of a Global Empire, Dies at 91 by Robert D. McFadden. New York Times obituary 28 October 2018
- Ingvar Kampra Founder of Ikea, the home-furnishing giant, who made a fortune from flat-pack furniture and meatballs, but lived a simple life The Times obituary 29 October 2018
- Ingvar Kamprad: IKEA Founder and One of the World's Richest Men by Scott Allen, at LiveAbout 05/30/19
References
- "Ingvar Kamprad, founder of IKEA", sweden.se. Retrieved 28 January 2018.^
- Forbes profile: Ingvar Kamprad & family Forbes^
- Caroline Roux. Ingvar Kamprad obituary The Guardian, 28 January 2018, retrieved 27 March 2026^