Tell me about IKEA

[gradtchr]

I love and adore IKEA!

As for furniture quality it depends on what you buy. We bought an entertainment center for our game room that is awesome! It is extremely high quality and made of solid wood. We have bookshelves from there that are also doing great. I think we got the Billy collection of shelves but I don't remember right now.

My favorite purchase though would be the Poang armchair. I love it!!

When you go make sure you have several hours to just browse and take it all in. I think DH's and my first trip lasted for 5 hours because there was just SO much to see.

 

[TLHB70]

After reading all of these great replies, I must admit that I am excited about getting this store!!!!!!! I may have to convince DH to make a trip to the Atlanta store just to see what it will be like.

 

[cardaway]

The only thing I don't like aobut the store is the crowds and how hard it can be to faind parking.

I love the store itself and the stuff they sell. We rarely ever come out without something. Their storage system can't be beat IMO and a lot of their furniture looks good as well.

The biggest drawback that I have heard people complain about is having to assemble most of the things they sell. It can be a pain.

I had to laugh when they made assembling one of their desks a challenge in The Amazing Race.

 

[Mickey527]

I am another who LOVES IKEA.
Every time I go there I find something I like. they have great chatskis, nicknacks, whatever you want to call them. I especially love the vases and table decorations.
I plan on furnishing my FL home if I ever move there with everything from IKEA. I already have it planned, leave all my heavy dark New England colonial furniture in my big heavy colonial and rent a U-Haul and fill it with all that light wood furniture. Unless they get an IKEA in FL which would make it alot easier.
I love to look at their catalog too. You should try and order a catalog so you can see what they have before they build the store.
And no one has mentioned this yet, but at IKEA if you are one of the first 100 to enter the store on opening day you get free stuff. They gave out their Poong chairs here in Ct when they opened. I didn't wait in line because I did that once for a Black Friday thing and vowed never to wait in store lines again, but some people like to give up a day or two for something free.
Peggie

 

[Anewman]

IKEA is the DEVIL.

The Wife goes shopping there for 2 hours, and I get to assemble things for 20 hours.

The DEVIL I tell you.

 

[chell]

After reading all of these great replies, I must admit that I am excited about getting this store!!!!!!! I may have to convince DH to make a trip to the Atlanta store just to see what it will be like.

Did you happen to hear them talking about it on The Link yesterday?

 

[Jennasis]

Oh my God Oh my God.......IKEA coming to Charlotte???? REALLY???? I am So happy right now!!! DH and I LOVE IKEA. We're only 45 minutes from Charlotte. We used to live on Long Island near the big Hicksville store. We miss it so much. Any idea the target opening date?

 

[TLHB70]

Oh my God Oh my God.......IKEA coming to Charlotte???? REALLY???? I am So happy right now!!! DH and I LOVE IKEA. We're only 45 minutes from Charlotte. We used to live on Long Island near the big Hicksville store. We miss it so much. Any idea the target opening date?

Yep!! It is coming!!!!!!!!! It was all over local news yesterday.
I don't know about opening date. They just said construction would start next year.

Did you happen to hear them talking about it on The Link yesterday?

No. I missed that. What was said?

IKEA is the DEVIL.

The Wife goes shopping there for 2 hours, and I get to assemble things for 20 hours.

The DEVIL I tell you.

I imagine DH will be sharing those same thoughts!!!!!

 

[Robinrs]

Our store is about 5 blocks from my job.... DANGEROUS!!

I love that place. It's the only store I could go to and stay all day!

 

[MyGoofy26]

The reason everything is cheap is they don't really have salespeople (you go into the warehouse and pick it up yourself) and you put it together yourself. We had a blast doing it and I have never had a bad experience there.

They also have very little waste. Any extra wood/fabric goes into the production of something else. A lot of the little decorative type stuff is made from the "leftovers" of the furniture.

I love Ikea. .. just to walk around and look. They set it up so that you flow from one area to another but it's like walking from room to room . . . they set up fully furnished rooms so that you can see how things look together and see them functionally. You can grab a piece of paper in the beginning and everything in those rooms has a tag with a "code" that tells you where to find it in the warehouse at the end. It's nice - you don't have to carry a thing, you go straight from the warehouse area to checkout to your car. The only thing you'd need to carry is all the small decorative things, dishes, etc but those are in the last section before the warehouse.

 

[Straitlover]

The news in Raleigh said it won't be open until sometime in 2009, so you've got plenty of time!!!

 

[Robinrs]

IKEA is the DEVIL.

The Wife goes shopping there for 2 hours, and I get to assemble things for 20 hours.

The DEVIL I tell you.

LOL!!

I actually assemble everything myself. I've never had a problem with any of it. I've had some serious issues with stuff I've had to assemble from Target but never from Ikea!

I also wanted to add I LOVE their little 99 cent breakfast! They have this drink called lingonberry juice that is so good!

Guess where I'LL be this weekend?

 

[TTFN]

Oh yeah...you need to go online to Ikea.com and order yourself a catalog. Then you can plan ahead for what you might need when the store finally opens!

 

[KristinBelle]

Our Ikea is opening in Fall 2007 according to Ikea.com. Can't wait!

 

[lucas]

I've never been to one but a store is supposed to open later this year in Sunrise, FL (close to the Sawgrass outlet mall). I can't wait to check it out cause I have heard so much about it.

 

[Galactic Emperor]

The furniture is ultra modern, Danish style furniture. Generally, you assemble it yourself when you get it home. The few things we have are just a melanine laminate, not high quality. But, it has all held up pretty well and their prices are very reasonable. It is a fun store to go through, lots of neat stuff to look at. And, they have a play room area available for kids.

Ikea is SWEDISH

 

[TLHB70]

Oh yeah...you need to go online to Ikea.com and order yourself a catalog. Then you can plan ahead for what you might need when the store finally opens!

oooohhhhh, I didn't even think about that.
I will definitely have to visit the web site!

 

[drag n' fly]

Hey dont forget the 50 cent hotdogs and the 1 dollar hot breakfast (I can feed the whole family for 5 bucks) and free babysitting (with a ball pit)! . Seriously it is huge in Canada! Most of the stuff in my house is Ikea because I have three kids, a dog, a cat, a macaw(the worst culprit lol) a cockatiel and 2 leaky fish tanks. I bought (2) $169 table sets with 4 chairs put them together and they look great! Just more cash to put towards another Disney vacation!

 

[Enchanted Tiki Bird]

Tell you about IKEA? Boy, can I ever! You see, I spent a whole year there, pretty much. I had a supervisor who worshipped IKEA and all of our one-on-one meetings would be there. It took me about five minutes to see why this was his mecca.

What is Ikea?

If you go to IKEA you will no doubt see a large blue box with very few windows. While the company began in Sweden, IKEA is literally worldwide, making an appearance in 34 countries. It began as early as the 1940s and it was the first company to develop the idea of furniture as fashion.

Why IKEA is Fun

As everyone else has pointed out, IKEA is an incredibly fun place to visit. There are many different styles of everything, including very beautiful and inexpensive artwork which was a favourite of mine. The style it boasts is called "modern utilitarian design". There are hardly any salespeople, which makes me really really happy, until you get to the warehouse-checkout section. I have found the products to be incredibly easy to put together. Also, IKEA tends to be extremely accomodating to customers, even going as far as offering complimentary shuttles to some store locations. And I agree with everyone else in that one of the best things to do is go to IKEA for 99 cent breakfast and Swedish-inspired foods.

Why IKEA Is A Great Company

But I'll tell you the real reason that IKEA is so great - because it is incredibly socially and environmental conscious. The whole idea of ready-to-assemble inex*****ve furniture came about from IKEA's goals of sustainability and environmental design. Environmental design is used to hold cost and resource use down. That's why they limit the packaging and by not assembling anything it takes less room for shipping and therefore less energy and money. As well, IKEA is extremely generous in its charitable donations. In fact, IKEA is technically owned by a charitable organization. It's also been rated as one of the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers.

SHOP THERE

If you can shop at IKEA, please do. In doing so, you are supporting a good company in a consumer society where so many bad ones exist. Not only that but it's a wicked fun experience.

 

[Mono~rail]

I've been trying to get into an IKEA for quite a few years now, but dh is a big meany head and won't stop to let me go in!

I can understand his point while we were in Europe a few years ago. He said that I would want to buy stuff then he would have to pay loads of money to get shipped home. He's was probably right.

We live 2 hrs from Houston, and I've been wanting to go to the one there. We actually did go one day, but couldn't find it! We are planning to re-do the bathrooms and both of us want to look at IKEA cabinets because we've seen lots of stuff we like on their site. :::excited:::