IKEA making it one of the largest users of wood in the retail sector. Most of IKEA's stores and factories were previously owned by INGKA, a holding company controlled by the Stichting INGKA Foundation, one of the 40 wealthiest foundations in the world. Ingvar Kamprad founded IKEA in 1943 as a mostly mail-order sales business. It began to sell furniture five years later. The first Möbel-IKÉA store was opened in Älmhult, Småland, in 1958 (Möbel means "furniture" in Swedish). The first stores outside Sweden were opened in Norway (1963) and Denmark (1969). The stores spread to other parts of Europe in
Easy Gardener Products, Inc. Easy Gardener Products, Inc. Easy Gardener Products, Inc. is an American multinational corporation headquartered in Waco, Texas that manufactures and sells gardening products. European operations are managed in London. Easy Gardener was founded in 1983 by Dick Grandy and Joe Owens. WeedBlock was the company's first product. Since then the company has grown through acquisitions and the introduction of new products. U.S. Home & Garden (known as Natural Earth Technologies before 1995), purchased Easy Gardener for $21 million in 1994. In 1996 it acquired Weatherly Consumer Products (which would become an Easy Gardener subsidiary), the parent company of the Jobe's