Quotes from Ingvar Kamprad

I am very proud to follow the rules of our company.

I've paid an awful lot of lawyers to protect what I've built. I can only hope the money was well spent.

People say I am cheap, and I don't mind if they do.

My theory was that good furniture could be priced so that the man with the flat wallet would be attracted to it, would make a place for it in his spending, and could afford it.

You can do so much in ten minutes' time. Ten minutes, once gone, are gone for good. Divide your life into 10-minute units and sacrifice as few of them as possible in meaningless activity.

I'm not afraid of turning 80 and I have lots of things to do. I don't have time for dying.

If there is such a thing as good leadership, it is to give a good example. I have to do so for all the Ikea employees.

Happiness is not reaching your goal. Happiness is being on the way.

We have to still develop the Ikea group. We need many billions of Swiss francs to take on China or Russia.

I look at the money I'm about to spend on myself and ask if IKEA's customers could afford it.

I feel many responsibilities - to our customers, to our employees, to the environment, to the world at large. But I don't want to feel responsible to investors, to outsiders with financial concerns that may differ from those of the welfare of IKEA.

I see my task as serving the majority of people. The question is, how do you find out what they want, how best to serve them? My answer is to stay close to ordinary people because, at heart, I am one of them.

An optimised tax structure gives us the possibility of flexibility in using our assets that have already been taxed in one market. They can be used in new markets for further business development without the additional burden of double taxation.

We have always looked at taxes as a cost, just as any other cost that comes with doing business.

Only those who are asleep make no mistakes.

The most dangerous poison is the feeling of achievement. The antidote is to every evening think what can be done better tomorrow.

Making mistakes is the privilege of the active. It is always the mediocre people who are negative, who spend their time proving that they were not wrong.

Time is your most important resource. You can do so much in ten minutes. Ten minutes; once gone is gone for good.

It is in the nature of Smaland to be thrifty.

Our idea is to serve everybody, including people with little money.

Everything we earn we need as a reserve.

It was our duty to expand. Those who cannot or will not join us are to be pitied. What we want to do, we can do and will do, together. A glorious future!

A better everyday life means getting away from status and conventions -- being freer and more at ease as human beings.

Once and for all, we have decided to side with the many.