Petrus Palmér doesn’t want Hem to be the next Ikea

“No Black Friday. No seasonal sales. No promotional pricing.” Earlier this year, Petrus Palmér, the founder and CEO of Hem, wrote these words on LinkedIn about his decision to do away with all discounts. This isn’t the first time Hem’s business model has changed course. Palmér founded the cult-favorite Swedish brand—known for its collaborations with some of today’s most cutting-edge designers—in 2014. It launched as primarily a direct-to-consumer brand, but that has since shifted. Today, the majority of the company’s sales come from trade and wholesale, something he says he’s happy with. More recently, Palmér took to LinkedIn again, calling out Ikea for appropriating Hem X, the company’s platform for creative collaborations. Ikea’s new Konstrunda collection, offering affordable art objects by seven makers, recently launched. In a video call from his home in Stockholm, Palmér spoke candidly about the complexities of going up against a behemoth like Ikea, why proper attribution matters, and what it takes to build a furniture business for the long term. This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity. In the spring, you decided to eliminate sales. What prompted that decision…