Only in Russia - IKEA in a Mall?
If you haven’t been to IKEA lately, you really are missing out on an experience that gives all your senses a workout. Including the 7th one which I am sure has something to do with homicidal tendencies. I go to IKEA so infrequently I actually forget why I vow to never go back; until I do. Yesterday was one of those moments. We needed a cabinet to hold, well, junk. Important junk. Looking online for a suitable cabinet only yielded items that had scary reviews; spit on cabinet and door falls off, or don’t touch the glass because it will shatter, and cabinet smells like solvent for 33 months. The same set of reviews follow similar items everywhere: on Amazon, Pottery Barn, Home Decorators, or Kinky’s Cabinets. Somehow that seemed suspicious and forced me to think about shopping in a store that had an actual door and merchandise I could sniff.
Mid-week IKEA was not busy so parking was not an issue. We were able to find a space not more than a ½ mile from the door. That is a good day considering that they offer a shuttle bus for the back forty on occasion. Though it was a lovely 70 degrees outside, and the inside was freezing, I could feel the sweat start to form when we entered the great hall, or as others call it, the entrance. You could fit an entire symphony orchestra, choir, and audience in that entrance without plugging up the pathway to the store.
In the smaller lobby there is the enticement of following the giant blue arrows on the floor, or going directly into the warehouse to pick out your item. Sadly, there is no way to identify where to find your item in the vast warehouse without first following the blue arrow- getting a pencil and order form to fill in the critical number, aisle and bin. To get the holy grail of numbers, you also have to first have to find your item on the floor - which can only be done by blindly following the blue arrows through the endless maze.
I tried the direct-to-the-warehouse route once and not only got lost, but remained lost for far longer than was reasonable as punishment for going opposite the blue arrows. Honestly, I sought help, but every single person reminded me that if I had followed the blue arrows, I would be found, not lost. When I remained silent they merely wished me god-speed and trotted away. I'd still be there if I hadn't just merged into a family group that seemed to know their way to the door.
We knew that book shelves with doors were our goal, but first you have to travel through beds, kitchens, sofas, chairs, toilet seats, knobs for bathrooms, knobs for kitchens, cutting boards, and next to that, mirrors. We walked past a hole in the wall with a kiddie gate that was apparently where you drop off children while you shop. Good luck getting back there to find them again.
Finally we found two items that fit our needs and one even matched our budget. We carefully wrote down the item numbers which are a sequence similar to the VIN for your car. Noting the warehouse aisle and bin on the same form, I was ready to leave.
The only problem was that leaving directly was not an option. The blue arrow insisted we move through more items, like posters, rugs, and stuff that I cannot recall. I asked for a shortcut to the warehouse, but everyone pointed to the arrows. Honestly, the building from the outside is just not that big but the inside felt like it expanded with every step we took. The warehouse was nowhere to be found.
Just when the sweat started dripping, I saw the entrance to the beloved warehouse which meant the cash registers were up ahead about a mile, and right beyond that, the great hall, a door and blue sky. Spirits lifted, I fast-walked to the correct aisle and bin.
It was empty, marked with a little sticker saying out of stock. The item on the floor did not have a sticker saying out of stock. Mind games! Did they think I would just randomly pull something from another bin because I was stuck on buying something? Finding someone to check the computer took courage because it meant going back the way we had come. And then we found out it would be two weeks before the item would be back in stock.
First – two weeks is ubiquitous for next to never in consumer-speak. Two weeks is a euphemism for we have no idea when it will arrive and it probably never will. I didn’t get this old without learning something.
The more expensive item was of course, in stock. Fortunately, it was not only way too big for our car, but the thought of carrying more than 100 pounds a half mile to the car seemed daunting. Delivery? Sure. Doubles the cheap IKEA price. Loading zone? Good luck. It’s located in a dark place that often takes two weeks for the stock person to emerge from with your item. By then, you may have forgotten what you bought.
Not only did that experience remind me why I never shop in IKEA, but that the idea of spending money to put junk away neatly was beginning to sound even more ridiculous. So I did the next best thing.
I baked a cake, ate some ice cream and threw out some junk and shoved the rest of it into a closet. It's all good. The door still closes.
The next time I get the bright idea to go to IKEA, someone send me this post.
The maze that would be IKEA
shoppers check in but they don't check out
Comments
i also swear to never go to ikea every time, too. but not because i mind the absurd size. no - because we always blow 150 bucks on 50 pieces of new junk we dont need. picture frames, cute plastic cups, some wine glasses. i am just powerless against such impossibly low prices. but then somehow we decide to go again anyway, the next year or so.
Hysterical! The last time I was in an IKEA was more than 10 years ago in Copenhagen where I returned the (imagine a strike through here: impossible easy to assemble dresser that comes complete with 697 screws and a wrench that causes blisters to form. The thing fell apart in various places if I only looked at it. I crammed the damn thing into two shopping carts, handed them the wrench and demanded my refund. It took me eight weeks to find the exit and by then, the exchange rate had taken a turn for the worse. ;)
I go just for the Swedish Meatball lunch plate. :-)
I think I was in a small one once...they had taken over a Macy's Men's Store in a mall....so they were very limited in space. It must have been decades ago.
I like your solution...
I like your solution...
IKEA is Swedish for exercise. The footpath always lands me in the food court right about the time the last drop of saliva has evaporated from my mouth. Exquisitely timed by those tricky Ikeans to keep me from collapsing before I reach the parking acreage. I rarely leave through the checkout line if that's any consolation on my way home. I just release my stranglehold on the basket I've been propped up on and stumble to the light leaving whatever in the world I might have thought I needed behind forever. It's better than running the track in the summer and the workout is just as grueling.
You have described the IKEA experience to perfection. I used to go but stopped after their stuff became complete junk that falls apart as you try to assemble it. A good idea gone horribly wrong.
My only Ikea experience occurred after a fall when I had just graduated from a walker to a cane, and I didn't know the store was closing in 20 minutes, and I assumed I could just turn around and leave through the door through which I entered. Imagine hobbling along the blue path as fast as you can hobble hearing "Attention fellow employees - the ( ) department is now cleared of customers" each time you leave a department.
IKEA is a maze that many never return from.
R
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I go to Ikea often enough in Seattle that I know where the shortcuts and pass throughs are located. We went recently and got some double-sided countertops, shelving and the hardware necessary to make our laundry room one to be envied. This project will be completed after the plumber comes to do some work in the adjacent utility room where the radiant heating and water heater are located so that we can enlarge the laundry space a bit and neaten up the utility area so that it no longer looks like Frankenstein's engineering school designed our radiant heating system.
Ikea does have some really good stuff if you understand what you are looking at. If we buy the cheapest thing in the cheapest store, well what can we expect? And I have seen how some folks put stuff together, and let's just say that tightening up the fittings is critical to the strength of the structure. KD furniture is a wonderful idea for those savvy enough to put it together properly.
The first trip to IKEA was mind boggling, even more so than the first trip to Costco.
Ikea does have some really good stuff if you understand what you are looking at. If we buy the cheapest thing in the cheapest store, well what can we expect? And I have seen how some folks put stuff together, and let's just say that tightening up the fittings is critical to the strength of the structure. KD furniture is a wonderful idea for those savvy enough to put it together properly.
The first trip to IKEA was mind boggling, even more so than the first trip to Costco.
First time I ever went to IKEA I had to leave. It's a labyrinth. It's a maze. I think it might be perfectly suitable to Northern Europeans used to being put into a "lock-step" but to me it caused a great deal of anxiety. Now if I go to IKEA it's with an agenda and I zoom through the parts I don't want to shop in and get to the area that has the stuff I might want to buy. Only then can I survive this nerve inducing milieu which is so uncomfortable.
Yup, Ikea is the Roach Motel of Retail experiences. Easy in, not so easily back out. They figure the more things you have to walk past, the greater the likelihood that you'll discover how many more things you need...mwahahahaahahaa!!! That's also the reason I never shop there on weekends.
Great post, and rated for courage.
Great post, and rated for courage.
I know how you feel. The road to perdition is paved with blue arrows.
What Denise said, verbatim. I only go for the Swedish meatballs. With lingonberries. Avoid the furniture if you dare.
I have lusted after an IKEA forever but never lived close enough to one to make it worth going. I felt like I was missing out on something BIG. Thanks to you, I now know that I was and I'm really ok about it.
I was just in IKEA last weekend in Tampa.
It’s so multicultural—crappy Swedish design, poorly made in China.
Cheap lunch though.
Rated for: IKEA—the bad idea.
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It’s so multicultural—crappy Swedish design, poorly made in China.
Cheap lunch though.
Rated for: IKEA—the bad idea.
.
I *LOVE* Ikea. You must abandon any hope of finding whatever you have seen on their web site, however. Just go and walk through, slowly, seeing what there is to see.
I love the design of the products. I like to browse. One time I half-filled my cart and went off to look at under-cabinet LED lighting and my cart had been removed when I got back to it. No great loss.
It's one of those once-every-year-or-two things that I just love doing.
I love the design of the products. I like to browse. One time I half-filled my cart and went off to look at under-cabinet LED lighting and my cart had been removed when I got back to it. No great loss.
It's one of those once-every-year-or-two things that I just love doing.
Oh my! Sounds like the only thing missing was those St. Bernard dogs who rescue lost people on mountainsides. I haven't been to IKEA in years, but reading about the infamous blue arrow made me all twitchy. Glad you made it out alive!
I have a love/hate relationship with IKEA. Seriously. My son likes to eat there....R
I just can't shop at Ikea. The layout does not make sense to me and I feel like there should be velvet ropes. Good POV
Addendum: While the store layout drives me crazy as does the futility of getting any kind of help... I have to admit, the furniture I bought from Ikea (and yes, put together myself), has still served me well. My computer desk, my living room coffee table and my diningroom storage cabinets are all still going strong with daily use.
But yeah, you gotta gird your loins for a trip into the belly of the DIY beast.
But yeah, you gotta gird your loins for a trip into the belly of the DIY beast.
I don't think I could live in a world without Ikea Swedish meatballs. Finding my way out is my exercise program to work them off.
So perfect. I'd never been until last weekend (thankfully, there's not one in Indianapolis). I won't go back soon.
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