Ikea coming to the Algarve, Portugal

Location confirmed for €200m IKEA store
13/3/2010

After months of speculation, the exact location of the new IKEA store that is set to take shape in Loulé was confirmed this week. By 2015 the store should be up and running, by the Loulé/Faro junction.

IKEA's expansion director for Portugal, António Machado, in comments to the Lusa News Agency, confirmed the store's location and said that the approximate €200 million investment would also directly create around 3,000 jobs.

Catering for the residents of the Algarve, lower Alentejo and Spanish border areas, the Inter IKEA shopping centre project covers 120,000 square metres.

The Swedish furniture giants have already purchased 40 hectares of land in Loulé on which to build its main store and shopping centre, which will also comprise a cinema, restaurants and entertainment.

In January, environmental agency Quercus accused IKEA of intending to build its Algarve outlet on protected RAN-classified land and appealed to CCDR/Algarve to "defend land ordaining and planning."

But the CCDR is a firm backer of the project.

"It is in the interest of the CCDR to capture investment for the region, primarily when it creates employment so long as it is compatible with the territorial model defined in the 'Prot Algarve' regional territorial plan", the Commission said last year when news of the store was first confirmed.

Loulé Town Hall has in the past said it would only accept the best offers when it came to building shopping areas in the Algarve's wealthiest city.

"We will not accept the first request to build a shopping centre that comes our way. But we will definitely have a major centre in Loulé in the foreseeable future", Loulé Mayor Seruca Emídio told The Portugal News two years ago when questioned over rumours a major group was buying up land in the council.

António Machado further guaranteed that the land of the now confirmed location "does not entail any environmental issues of importance".

"We are in the initial phase of the project. Today we chose the location for our investment which will take shape near the Loulé/Faro junction. This was the most suitable location for the project in terms of accessibility, visibility, and within criteria that has been defined by the local authorities", he explained.

By 2015 IKEA will have invested 1.1 billion in Portugal and is expected to create up to 10,000 jobs, significantly higher figures than were originally announced in 2008, when the Group said it would be investing €660 million in Portugal.

António Machado revealed, "We want to open a total of seven IKEA stores in Portugal, plus three more shopping centres, 'Mar Shopping' in Matosinhos, the Regional Shopping Centre in the Algarve, a retail park in Gaia, and have three more Swedwood factories, which is an IKEA sub-group that manufactures furniture, up and running by the end of the year".

Source The Portugal News