Saturday, April 15, 2017

Sketches for New Oak Creek IKEA Revealed

In Sweden, in 1943, a home furnishings company named IKEA was born. Now, 74 years later, IKEA has over 315 stores; 50+ stores are located in North America, and another one is on the way! At the end of February 2017, sketches of a new IKEA store in Oak Creek were released; the sketches included the layout of the store and parking lot. Since IKEA is planning to open the store during the summer of 2018, construction will begin quite soon. Once the store is completed, Wisconsinites can expect 250 new, full-time jobs to be created! In addition to the new IKEA jobs, Steve Scaffidi, former Oak Creek Mayor, mentions how the new store will bring over a million people each year to support local restaurants, hotels, and other brick-and-mortar retail stores. It is excellent to hear how government officials are working hard to bring new business to Wisconsin!
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2 comments:

  1. UnknownApril 26, 2017 at 6:09 AM

    All is not popular in Foreign Direct Investment in Wisconsin to me. Ikea’s retail investment in Oak Creek is great for adding some jobs to Wisconsin however these jobs are still part of the service sector. I would like to see more manufacturing based foreign investment. It is understood that Manufacturing is far more sensitive to the business cycle however, according to the Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics manufacturing employment peaked in June 1979 and has never recovered which in fact is steadily declining.

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  2. Mary SpaethMay 11, 2017 at 9:11 PM

    Your comments are justifiable Jamie. Retail is exciting for the owners of retail, but chains, especially international chains, provide hourly wages and much of the income is not put back into the local economy--although communities do well with the tax benefits (if the municipality hasn't foregone too much via TIF financing schemes. You'll see in this article that IKEA did indeed get a TIF (tax increment financing) agreement: http://www.press-citizen.com/story/news/local/oak-creek/2017/02/07/fast-path-ikea-oak-creek-store-plans-rapidly-taking-shape/97572292/

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