LEGO

1 in 1934 in Denmark
2 Ole Kirk Christiansen. An early story about how he was angry when his grandson only varnished
their wooden toys twice, rather than three times, shows he was focused on good quality.
3 His grandson. He joined the business and helped make the toys.
4 ‘Only the best is good enough.’ He demonstrated it by demanding quality and telling his grandson
off when he tried to cut corners.
5 From the Swedish legt godt – meaning ‘to play well’.
6 From a British company, Kiddicraft.
7 Quality and the endless creativity the product provided.
8 Sets can be complicated to construct and standing on LEGO bricks in bare feet can be painful.
9 By 2003, sales were down and efforts to diversify were not successful and almost resulted in the
company going bankrupt.
10 1958
IKEA
1 In 1943 in Sweden.
2 Ingvar Kamprad. When his father criticized him for getting up too late, he took the off button off
his alarm clock – this shows he was very driven.
3 His father – he gave him some money.
4 ‘It’s better to sell 600 chairs at a lower price than sell 60 chairs at a high price’ – he then went on
to sell furniture in bulk, as cheaply as possible.
5 The initials of his name and his boyhood address.
6 His main competitor for his initial mail order company – they sold furniture too.
7 Low prices and flatpack furniture.
8 The instructions on the flatpack furniture.
9 There were early problems with wood supply, when suppliers boycotted IKEA. They have also
had some cultural problems when expanding abroad, e.g. American customers thought glass vases
were drinking glasses.
10 2018

* A telling-off means being admonished/talked to about something you have done wrong. Ole told
Godtfred off for trying to cut corners with varnishing the wooden toys.
* Business consultants are business experts who analyse companies and their profitability. Business
consultants said that the plastic brick was dead.
* To diversify means to move out of your original area of business and move into other areas, too –
LEGO diversified into clothes, jewellery, video games and LEGOLAND parks.
* Went bust means went bankrupt/lost all its money. LEGO nearly went bust.
*Quadrupled means multiplied by four. In 2015, LEGO became the world’s most powerful brand,
having quadrupled its profits since 2008.

* In bulk means in very large quantities – Kamprad asked his grandmother to buy match boxes for
him in bulk
* Goods means products – Kamprad started a company selling household goods
* Driven means determined – an early story shows how driven Kamprad was – he removed the ‘off’
button from his alarm clock!
* To boycott means to refuse to do business with – wood suppliers were persuaded by other
furniture manufacturers to boycott IKEA
* A lightbulb moment means suddenly having a good idea – flatpack furniture – the idea came
when a colleague couldn’t get an IKEA table into his car
* Storage means keeping goods in one place before they can be sold – flatpack furniture brought
huge savings in storage costs for IKEA.