SEOUL, KOREA - Korea's homegrown furniture retailers see their financial performance improve quickly. That's largely because the companies started opening up large-scale retail spaces and increasing the portion of low-priced furniture items in response to the landing of the world's largest furniture seller IKEA in Korea at the end of this year.

 

For example, the nation's largest furniture seller Hanssem posted 591.3 billion won in sales revenue for the first half of this year, up 39.3 percent from a year ago. Its operating profit also increased 31.7 percent to 46.9 billion won from 35.6 billion won during the same period.

 

Kim Dong-sung, public relations manager with Hanssem, said, "From the flagshop that was opened in March this year, we are raking in 4-5 billion won sales revenue a month. Our online Hanssem Mall has steadily maintained over 30 percent growth rate." The company's six large retail stores across the country are earning about 20-25 billion won a month on average.

 

Hyundai Livart also reported the first-half sales revenue of 345.6 billion won, up 22.8 percent from the same period last year. Its operating profit for the same period increased as much as 351.3 percent. It was largely because of the discount stores that opened in the first half, including the ones in Junggok, Eojung, and Dogok. Another furniture brand Enex that specializes in kitchen furniture also reported higher sales revenue (126.2 billion won) and operating profit (3.9 billion won).