La vivienda, como la sanidad o como la educación, es uno de esos asuntos fundamentales que retratan a una sociedad. Por eso Mia Lundström (1958), directora creativa de Ikea, recuerda que ellos llevan años democratizando el mobiliario doméstico. En poco más de siete décadas, el mayor fabricante de enseres domésticos del planeta (con 350 tiendas) ha ido haciéndose, y corrigiéndose, mientras crecía y para 2020 anuncia un objetivo sin precedentes: ser energéticamente independiente. Eso implica generar, o acumular, el 100% de la energía que consuman sus oficinas, tiendas y almacenes. Pero antes, para agosto de 2015, la empresa se ha comprometido a que todo el algodón que utilizan sea ecológico (de acuerdo con los parámetros de la iniciativa Better cotton, es decir: cultivado con menos agua, con menos pesticidas y con un mayor margen de beneficio para los granjeros). Hay más calendario planificado. Para 2016, toda la iluminación provendrá de bombillas led –de bajo consumo y larga vida–, y un año más tarde, todos sus productos serán, en un 98%, reciclados, reciclables o realizados con materias renovables.

To talk about that future that they only imagine sustainable they have summoned the international press in their new älmhult offices, in southern Sweden, in the sober democratic design center, which already meets those goals.We are in the town where, 71 years ago, Ingmar Kamprad founded the company selling cash boxes to its neighbors.And it is not exaggerated to say that half of its 9.000 inhabitants work today - direct or indirectly - for the firm.At the hotel (Ikea, of course) there are rumors that, after years living in Switzerland, the old man, 88, has returned to the town and has left a beard to go unnoticed.

But nobody carries a beard among the group of designers and managers who have met in the new property that accumulates and does not waste energy.

Why is it called a democratic design center?"We want to design for everyone and make it possible for years," explains Lundström.

They don't do it anymore?"We want to reach more people.Mix ourselves with other cultures, with other ways to produce, combine industry and crafts, microentrepreneurs with large producers, and at the same time we want to take into account the population that does not have access to a toilet, ”he says.Interesting in a client who has no money is certainly a paradigm shift for this and for any company.The design chief is convinced that sustainability cannot only be material and must also be social.

IKEA has credibility.When two years ago they started selling plasma televisions, people trusted their brand even though they had no experience in screens manufacturing.I may encourage by that achievement, they have now launched something similar with solar panels.For a year they can be purchased at the 18 stores in the United Kingdom (about 700.000) that this firm has been installing in the covers of their warehouses for three years.With a price of 4.643 euros, they are the cheapest in the market.It is clear that doing the sustainable accessible is the door to extend that practice."There is no other way, sustainability cannot be a luxury that only a few can afford," explains the CEO Peter Agnefjäil (1971).That is the new objective of the main furniture supplier on the planet, but what is the way to sustainability?

The only one between 400 people dressed in a suit and tie, the company's maximum head, also removes its dish after the food in the great canteen of the firm.That equal treatment that nobody seems to surprise is what they intend to lead to sustainability.That is why Agnefjäil says that, over the years, they have been adding values to the company's DNA."Above offering news, we want to be necessary," he explains.He is convinced that sustainability is the most direct way to become irreplaceable."Without her there is no future.We are a great company and we need a tomorrow.That is why we think that we must set an example and that, with the size we have, we can promote a change ”.The weight of being exemplary made this manager feel a number: the 700 million annual visitors that the Ikea website has.“If each of those clients replaced an incandescent bulb with another LED, the change would be huge.And we would play an important role for the world.We don't want to sell at any price ".

In addition, that a business giant manufactures basic products for the sustainable reconversion of households and for construction (of solar panels to toilets that work without water) allows them to reach many more places in the world.Maybe that is why, above announcing sales and expansion plans, in Sweden they want.Agnefjäil explains that they have 100 mills producing wind energy next to their warehouses and that they have invested in the construction of 100 more.

But there are more changes.A little over a decade ago Ikea's secretism was questioned internationally by not revealing what allowed him to sell at such tight prices.Since 2000, as part of a package of improvements, Ikea made public that not only does not accept child labor, he also collaborates with UNICEF and Save The Children in Children's Education.He also works with WWF creating schools for farmers in India and Pakistan, where it is taught, among other things, saving water (30%) and using less pesticides (50%).Thus, beyond depending on renewable energy, in Ikea they announce more transparency.They want to explain where things come from, how much do they cost and who makes them.They want to identify the materials, draw their origin of controlled logging forests.And they have one more figure: 1.5 billion euros to make the company a sustainability model.

Maybe that's why Lundström believes that the time has come to return to the basics: to the function.“Ikea needs the unequivocal message of the simple: the saucepan, the sink, the indispensable spoon or the chair.Neither the whim nor the fashions can enter that elementary part ”.

It suggests that they manufacture too many products?How to communicate the objective of sustainability with so much cheap variety that seems an invitation to use and throw?

“It's crazy to think that because something costs little less valuable.We do not sell garbage.A strainer can last decades.The same as the vessels.The variety seeks to reach more people ”;The one who thinks now is Marcus Engman (1966).The current head of the company's design grew in älmhult and, after training in marketing and founding his own firm, today occupies the position that his father directed years ago.At that time, he worked at the Ikea store of the town - the first of the chain - on weekends.Today is a man of world.

Also Peter Agnefjäil defends the need to serve a wide variety of customers with a wide range of products: "We believe in sustainability, not in uniformity".The CEO uses the word transparency again: "People are curious to know how we work and have decided to explain it".He is the one who talks about opening the black box of Ikea, telling where ideas come from.

However, researcher Mikael Ydholm (1959) is in favor of limiting the offer "or doing all multifunctional products", specifies."Or that, or learn to live in another way".Ydholm works as an anthropologist.He is responsible for the Life AT Home (life at home) report, which compares the domestic habits of citizens of Bombay, Stockholm or New York.That is why he explains that daily, before leaving their home, the prayers of the Indians occupy 50% of that population, while in Sweden, the time spent in looking for clothes that do not find in the closet is around eight minutes.

Like a Big Brother, Ikea has gotten into the houses of 48 families.The filmed have not charged money (although gift checks).The result of the investigation concludes that what they say does not match what they do.Ydholm says that we dedicate seven minutes to breakfast and that only 16% of the population exercise in the morning.With that type of data, he and his team investigate what the floors will be like in a decade.Reason that the future cannot be predicted: "You have to do it".And puts examples to prepare the houses for change: “We plan to offer basic products to whom it starts from very little.We have observed that people do not like the drill or nails.We want to change place a painting or a mirror without having to convert to DIY ”.

With your research hanging on the Internet, you are convinced that your company's website can become a tool to educate how to accumulate and save energy at home.It is in that communication route where he sees a future key.And the CEO Agnefjäil supports him defending collaboration in front of the competition."That will be the big change.But nobody can achieve it, ”says Marcus Engman.Hence they have decided to function in open, with transparency: “When communicating our research, people give us more data or make us more criticism.I think you must give to receive ".

Little money, reusable materials, microproductors ... At this point, Lundström announces what you still can't: that Ikea will get where no furniture manufacturer has arrived, where people barely have a house.It is the great challenge of the company.It may seem idealistic.But, in part, that conviction has been provided by one of the last signings of the firm, the British Steve Howard (1966).This environmental physics doctor is a group's sustainability head since 2011.He is the one who, when they went to look for him to write “a sustainability plan that everyone could understand”, was blunt and proposed that, instead of reducing emissions to be fulfilled, Ikea should be transformed: becoming 100% sustainable.He was the one who made the 700 install.000 solar panels, who was marking the targets of the calendar and who proposed to sell plates in the stores."Sustainability cannot be a fashion.We have decided not to put patches ".

After seven decades trying to improve houses, Ikea has proposed to improve the world for pure logic: turned into one of the greatest global brands, there are few options beyond contributing to the survival.With enthusiasm, the CEO Peter Agnefjäil reasons that "the price, function, quality and design are no longer enough, it is basic that the existence of a new product does not get worse the world".

For the new stage, Agnefjäil talks about "sharing instead of competing".He explains that there were already many politicians and NGOs who “wanted, in addition to growth and benefit, there was talk of responsibility, not doing things at any price.A better life for many people cannot be achieved alone.Nor isolated ".

Sustainability begins in the supplier.Continues to simplify manufacturing and transportation.There the designer intervenes.Carl Öjerstam (1971) wanted to be because his mother is one of the best Swedish designers: Kersti Sanoin Bülow, founder of the company subject.His first job was produced by Ikea while he was a student.They had seen him in an exhibition and hired him.He was 22 years old.Today he has devised more than twenty products and won two Red Dot design awards for the company.

Öjerstam considers that the product that summarizes Ikea's will is the Lampan lamp (2004), which is sold for less than three euros.The screen reminds the old ones - "When you are going to sell something a lot, you need people to recognize it" - and serve as an packaging hiding the portal mocking and removable foot.Total: four components included a clamping arito and all the safety regulations met."Philippe Starck has already made two versions, but, of course, at what prices," jokes Öjerstam.

"There is no other way than sustainability.We are all on the same ship.If the planet sinks, we lose all, ”he says."A large company has no future outside the energy and renewable materials," insists Engman.Thus, the legendary idea of not transporting air and the reduction in the transport that causes a chain reaction until the price has decided to take it to sustainability.That's what they are.On the way they want to be transparent.That is why they do not announce good intentions: they put the cards on the table.