Business Case Studies & Business Publications

Sustainable Wood Sourcing at IKEA: The V...

Roy, Dwaipayan;Mis...

Case

Sustainable Wood Sourcing at IKEA: The Vietnam Acacia Program

Roy, Dwaipayan; Mishra, Anant

OM-1860 | Published May 18, 2026 | 8 Pages Case

Collection: Darden School of Business

Product Details

Anna Lindberg, IKEA’s Southeast Asia sourcing manager, must decide how the company can deepen responsible wood sourcing in Vietnam without undermining affordability, flexibility, or credibility. Although Vietnam accounted for only 3% of IKEA’s virgin wood supply, the country was strategically important as a source of acacia wood for key product lines. The case explores IKEA’s effort to build a sustainable acacia supply chain in Vietnam’s fragmented smallholder forestry sector, where early harvesting, inconsistent land records, and weak traceability through intermediary traders created operational and reputational risk. Working with the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), IKEA developed a linkage sourcing model that connected Forest Stewardship Council (FSC)–certified farmer groups to approved processors through training, shared certification, documentation support, and offtake commitments. The model improved farmer incentives and supply chain transparency, but persistent risks of mixing certified and noncertified wood and rising demands for plot-level verification raised questions about whether the approach could scale within and beyond Vietnam. The case is appropriate for courses on strategic sourcing, supply chain management, and sustainability.

• Understand the trade-offs of sustainable sourcing in decentralized, smallholder-dominant supply chains. • Evaluate sourcing-model design, including the linkage model’s structure, benefits, and vulnerabilities. • Compare transactional and relational sourcing and identify when deeper partnerships, capability building, or vertical integration may be appropriate. • Debate strategic pathways for large global buyers seeking reliable, sustainable, low-cost supply in emerging markets.