So yesterday my roommate and I decide that since we're all moved in, wouldn't it be great to fill our great new apartment with furniture?

I've never owned any furniture, to be honest. This was a first to me.

So as women with moderate income we decided to go to Ikea. It's new around here. People are always on the trains with their Ikea bags.

Little did we know it was going to be a 7 hour inferno.

The staging is beautiful. It really is. However, it does not allow quick glancing and shopping. AND OMG it's a 'Kid Friendly' store so there are children EVERYWHERE. I am tolerant of children, I even like them (I am an educator), but not in furniture stores.

There is no one around to help. Granted, that's one of the reasons their furniture is cheaper than most every other place. So we try our luck putting down the aisle and bin number. Ugh, this process takes forever because what if we want the black/brown countertop not the birch countertop? Or what kind of legs do we want?

Take into account that there must have been thousands of people around us and hundreds of strollers. Every man for himself. Now usually I respect that, but not when I am trying to pick out Swedish home furnishings made in china.

Actually what amused me/pissed me off the most was that I was expected to carry this super heavy table top off the middle shelf without even a step stool in sight, let alone someone who could possible help me not get crushed. Do you know what ensues when you allow hundreds of people in a warehouse at once? Do you know what this otherwise blissful place of design genius becomes when there are strollers and toddlers in a warehouse space? HELL.

We finally check out at the 6th hour. Then wait the 7th hour at the Home Delivery section. As far as I'm concerned, that was the wisest $79 I've ever spent.

Planned Ikea return date: never.



Oooh, I did like their ad campaign though...

__________________
The fresh heartbreak was, in a sense, like being in a foreign country; everything seemed alien, brilliant and glinting. It was as if I’d been flayed, so that even the air hurt. When you’re that unhappy, any glimmer of beauty or consolation feels like running into an old friend abroad, or seeing mountaintops through smog. Maybe we mistakenly think we want “happiness,” which we tend to picture in very vague, soft-focus terms, when what we really crave is the harder-edged intensity of experience.

when i last went to ikea me and my roomie had to carry a coffee table, flat pack bookshelf and bags of shit home on the tube
during rush hour

it was awesome, i love ikea. go on a Tuesday or something


when i move i can't wait to go to ikea again

__________________
said thanks for the insults and compliments
you'll never forget my face no more

ugh, that really sounds like hell. you have my sympathy, i would go insane if that happened to me. little space and huge amounts of people is a terrible, terrible combination.
if i were you i probably wouldn't want to go again aswell.

but in case you ever need more relatively cheap furniture:
as you were having it home delivered anyways you could just get the catalogue and order what you want?
or, if they don't take orders (i don't know if they do?) you could pick out what you want from the catalogue (like the wood, the legs) and just pick it up in the store. that way you wouldn't have to spend so much time in there and maybe could go on a weekday aswell, like lexy suggested.

__________________
And I want to play hide-and-seek and give you my clothes and tell you I like your shoes and sit on the steps while you take a bath...

Ah yes, Mr W. & I made the trek out to IKEA during our recent vacation. Going on a weekday did not mean it wasn't insane, although to be totally fair, the place had only been open about six weeks. They don't exactly have proceedures down yet, and to cover, no person employed there will look you in the eye.

I wasn't ready to kill anybody until we spent over 2 hours in Home Delivery. First, the cashier screwed up how many of a certain thing we'd bought, and apparently we pay in blood for that. After waiting a full hour on line to arrange for the delivery, we were told we had to go to a seperate person to pay for the thing the cashier didn't charge us for. We then spent AN ENTIRE OTHER HOUR standing behind ONE couple who were having items delivered to two different places. At one point, this for some reason involved the Ikea person we were waiting to pay walking the man over to the returns department and staying there with him through an entire return process.

So about 45 minutes in I'm having a really hard time not dropping to the floor kicking and screaming like a toddler who didn't get a nap (actually, I'm sort of having hard time not doing that now just remembering all of this). Then, when we are finally being helped, there was somone else trying to arrange for delivery and the person who sent us to wait behind that one couple for an hour says "Oh, just interrupt and say you only need to pay." Me: "Is that what we were supposed to do? No one said that. WE HAVE BEEN STANDING HERE WAITING FOR A FULL HOUR." Her: "Did I not say that?"

__________________
We are sorry, the mind you have reached is not a working mind.
Please hang up and die again.
Please hang up,
And die again.

I don't know why anybody would buy shit from IKEA. Most of their shit is plastic cheap furniture that falls apart rather quickly. I'd rather just spent the money and get quality.