He is now one of the worlds richest self-made billionaires with a net worth of $48.1 billion.
Inherently simplistic and extremely wealthy, Kamprad remains confident and courageous and an innovative thinker.
Kamprad was born on March 30, 1926 in Pjatteryd, Sweden.
His paternal grandfather was from Germany, but moved the family to Sweden.
By the age of five, he began selling matches for profit.
In his teens, Kamprad was influenced by his German grandmother who was a great admirer of Hitler.
He even wrote a letter to his employees asking them to forgive him.
The money given by his father was used by him to start IKEA in 1943.
These are the personality traits that made him a brave innovator in the start of his career.
He also moved himself and his family to Switzerland to protest against Swedens increasing taxes.
However, the corporation is now based in the Netherlands, and Kamprad himself has since returned to Sweden.
Kamprad runs a complex corporate structure that includes a charitable arm and a retail and franchise arm.
Kamprad married his first wife Kerstin Wadling and they adopted a daughter, Annika.
There has been speculation about the true value of Kamprad and his familys wealth for the past few years.
However, his net worth was valued at $48.1 billion, according to Wealth-X.
Two books have been published about the IKEA story.
Written in 1976, it has since been considered the fundamental ideology of the IKEA furniture retail concept.
Kamprad is known by his peers to be incredibly simple and plain.
He never stays at expensive hotels, and has driven the same Volvo for two decades.
Spanning 47 countries, IKEA today has 370 stores.
IKEA Food Services accounted for about $1.8 billion in sales last year.
Swedish favorites like meatballs and waffle desserts are available for purchase in-store and online.
Oh, I have so much work to do and no time to die, he said.
source: www.techworm.net
