by Also, a roundup of news updates on Ikea Germany
BERLIN — A study abroad trip planted me in Germany’s capital for a month, and when in Berlin, do as the Berliners do and go to Ikea. (This is easy to do because Berlin is home to no fewer than six Ikea locations, including three big-box stores.) Fun fact: Berliner also means “jelly roll,” a linguistic double duty that gives JFK’s quote, “Ich bin ein Berliner,” an entirely different meaning.
Before Ikea, though, a quick pulse of the German furniture industry, which is still Europe’s largest. Germany’s consumer market for furniture is an estimated €38.7 billion, or $44.2 billion, with furniture specialists claiming $38.9 billion of that total. Both are shrinking, however. The overall market is down 1.2% for the first six months of 2026 compared to the same period last year; specialists are down 2% for the same period. Furniture manufacturing is under even more strain, with wholesale sales down nearly 4% over the past six months.
All of these figures come from Furnilytics, which I’m going to trust even though that’s a goofy name.
Like the U.S. market, Germany is leaning harder than ever on imports, which now supply more than two-thirds of the German market. This is up from roughly 55% eight years ago. Monthly domestic production peaked at about $2.5 billion in sales in May 2022, which is roughly where this metric stood at the start of 2015.
Why is demand soft? Oh, I bet you can guess. The fundamentals mirror those of the U.S.: Housing activity is still well below 2019 levels, and consumer confidence is mired below sea level at a negative 16.5.
Where does Germany get its imports? Now this might surprise. Neighboring Poland is Germany’s dominant supplier, and by a wide margin. Monthly imports climbed from $337.2 million in 2021 to more than $411.6 million in 2025. The Czech Republic is second, but it is fast growing as an important source country to Germany with sales up to roughly $217.2 million per month.
China is a very different story. Chinese imports peaked around $291.5 million per month in 2022, but fell sharply in 2023. And while there’s been a partial recovery, levels have not returned to those earlier highs. Part of this volatility is currency-driven, because of fluctuations in the value of the euro relative to the dollar. But, the message is clear: Eastern Europe is proving more vital to the German market while Asia becomes less important.
Ich bin ein Ikea shopper
Let’s telescope in on one major player in the German market as both a producer and a retailer. Intrigued by a press release trumpeting what Ikea calls “quiet hours” only in its German stores beginning in June, my wife and I trekked to the Ikea superstore in the Tempelhof area of south Berlin. The release claims that Ikea Germany is among the first major retailers to act on research finding that workers in the U.S. report rising levels of “AI brain fry,” an indication that work environments are ratcheting up the mental strain for everyone.
A study released in the spring by Boston Consulting Group surveyed roughly 1,500 employees in the United States and identified a cluster of symptoms — mental exhaustion, difficulty concentrating — linked to heavy use of artificial intelligence tools.
Ikea’s “act” is, at least according to the release, the introduction of quiet hours every Wednesday between 5 p.m. and 7 p.m., a policy that calls for softer, quieter music, dimmer lighting and a bare minimum of in-store announcements.
“The goal is to lower sensory input for both customers and staff,” the release states. “We want to create a less stimulating and less stressful shopping environment in our stores — for neurodivergent people, families with young children, older people, people with mental health challenges and anyone who might prefer a calmer shopping experience. We want to reduce visual and acoustic stimuli in order to make shopping possible for people in our society who, due to their impairments, find it difficult to visit shops or move around in public spaces.”
The policy also calls for considerate behavior from co-workers and other customers, and in the restaurants, as well as reductions in noise. For example, loud signals from the ovens in the kitchen are supposedly turned down.
These quiet hours are only in Ikea’s German stores and, yes, dogs are welcome. Presumably quiet dogs.
All of this sounds terrific, but my wife and I were there from 5 p.m. until 6:30 p.m., a visit that included knocking back several meatballs from the restaurant, and apparently the Tempelhof store did not get the memo. The music did not change; the noise levels remained fairly high; and the restaurant proved most non-quiet. I asked an Ikea staffer in the home furnishings area about the quiet hour policy; she was only vaguely aware of it.
Right next door, however, a wonderfully eclectic home furnishings retailer, Tischhelden Lifestyle Interior, had zero interest in quiet hours. Salsa music flowed from loudspeakers outside the store, reeling us in through big wooden doors into a wonderland of crushed velvet, Latin color palettes and room vignettes that transport the customer back to the 1970s . . . in a good way!
Ikea gets most things right, and it innovates as consistently as any company in home furnishings anywhere. But quiet hours? A dud. Sorry, neurodivergents.
Getting smaller
Ikea Germany also made news last month with the launch of its first compact store in the country, specifically in Ingolstadt, Bavaria’s city center. Ikea’s shift to smaller retail formats and footprints is well documented, and the retail group Ingka Group is leading the way.
Open since June 25, the new store in Bavaria is 32,000 square feet into which 3,600 products are packed. Ingka Group is pushing the more accessible format in urban areas in the United Kingdom, Poland, the United States and France. France’s first compact Ikea store opened in Limoges on June 4. Le Mans is soon to follow.
The largest retailer of Ikea, Ingka Group announced a $5.7 billion plan to open 10 compact stores in France by 2030, or stores approximately one-tenth the size of traditional Ikea stores, and upgrading stores across its 32 markets. For France specifically, Ingka Group has earmarked $40 million.
Additional compact store roll-outs are planned for Portugal, Spain, Italy, Canada and Finland.
Ingka Group represents 87% of global Ikea retail sales.
But not all the Ikea news out of Germany has been good. In June, thousands of retail workers walked out during collective bargaining negotiations, and Ikea was among the primary targets of the unrest. Led by the trade union Verdi, the strike included employees at 31 furniture stores.
Ikea has stated that the strike’s impact has been “limited,” with none of the chain’s 54 German stores closing for any period of time.
