Phil Barker Web Developer, Petrol Head & Wannabe Photographer

Shop at Ikea…? I'd rather stab myself!

So last night I offered to head over to Ikea in Leeds with my mum to help her buy a new TV cabinet and load it in the car. I could also have done with some shelving for my spare room, and some drawers for my bedrooom.

It was my first ever visit to Ikea, and while there is breath left in my body will be my last too.
I have never before come across such a retarded stock control system in operation.

When you arrive you are guided into an area filled with all their furniture and items in real-life layouts. It takes about an hour and a half to walk around all these mock bedrooms, kitchens, bathrooms etc.. but its technically a brilliant idea as you can write down what you want as you go round and get ideas of how to layout your own house.
I took pictures of everything I liked and the little tags telling me where to collect them at the end… brilliant so far. In my head I’d spent triple what I’d budgeted by the time we got round it all.

Then comes the staggeringly retarded part – you walk out the back into a warehouse full of flat packed furniture. You collect a trolley and are expected to then find all the items you want on the racking and pick it yourself. No problem I thought, IQ over 50 and the racks are labeled we should have no problem.

First row – chest of drawers, oh no they’re out of stock. Thats a pain, well I’ll get the others I liked, no wait they’re out of stock of those too.
Hrmmmmmm well what about the storage solution I wanted for the spare room… nope sold out as well. What about the other 3 storage solutions, oh sold out too!
Ok what about the nice expensive tv/media cabinet my mum wants – sold out too….. riiight

Then my mum goes over to the information desk to ask if they have a catalogue as we can’t remember the other stuff that that possibly could have worked, and don’t really want to drive for 90minutes home empty handed. They don’t have catalogues, but the guy at the information desk tells her if she goes to the information desk they can help her.

Errrr hi? Retarded much? Honestly to work at Ikea I think you have to actually have an IQ level which makes breathing challenging.
About this point I felt like stabbing myself, you waste over an hour of your life picking furniture out and planning your own house, only to get to the end to find out they have literally nothing in stock.

If you are considering a trip to Ikea I can tell you know, save yourself some time… load up the Ikea website and browse all their lovely goods, then sit and stare at a wall and waste 4 hours of your life. It save’s the petrol and has the exact same outcome!