to be scared of going to Ikea

[Islandlady]

They actually have something I like but I cant buy it on line so I have got to actually go to one of their stores.

I have only been once and that was to use the loo.

I asked on another forum about long queues and having to walk in the one direction but was told there are arrows on the floor but you dont have to walk the way they want you to.

I dont want to go but really like a wall lamp they have.

I need reassurance that all will be OK

Come on Rockbird it's not "girly screaming", haven't you seen the Kath and Kim episode where Brett gets freaked out in IKEA? It's "human screaming". I had a male friend who went once, got lost between the showroom and the warehouse and said "never again".

IKEA can be a really unpleasant shopping experience, because it was designed for Sweden where there are far fewer people, and they all have huge cars to take their wardrobes home in. And they are all very fit and sensible so don't mind lugging things about and checking off lists of 300 cupboard parts. It isn't meant to get as packed and chaotic as it does in the busy London ones, but they insist on keeping all their procedures the same. The nightmarishness of the shopping experience hasn't so far stopped them making pots of wedge, because the stuff is so good for the price that people just put up with it, so IKEA don't need to change anything. It's still reasonable to whinge about it!

So you're saying the British are weak, slow, overcrowded pansies with small cars and an inability to find their way around the shop?

Its a fucking shop. I bought an entire flatpack kitchen and managed to get it all onto trolleys and home in my pre-arranged van. Its a piece of piss if you have half a brain.

It's just not a delightful shopping experience. You won't get called Ma'am or have doors opened for you, nothing will be double wrapped in tissue paper.

It is what it is, crap service because us Brits are mug enough to tolerate it. Having said that if you've got a free couple of hours the Bazaar section is very browse able.

If we have a competition of who lives furtherst from their nearest Ikea, I win flat out. 8 hours drive. Across the borders. To farking, mozzie infested Finland. (I am sure Finland is very nice. But the road to Happaranda is far from a happy one, it is straight, I am telling you, straight through fields and pine forests, for 8 hours. Not ONE gas station has a working card facility, so we need to exchange to Euros before going, and not ONE gas station is open after 8 pm. You end up spending the night outside a gas station, waiting for it to open, so you can buy your petrol, in person, with a grumpy morning grotty Fin, who dont speak a word of English)

Count yourself lucky, it is only a shop, even if you need to ride through rough waters to get there.

You can go to the cafe, and order lovely meatballs in gravy, with a generous helping of cranberry sauce. Then have a dime bar cake after. For like, 4 pounds in total. Lucky you.

Alouise, if you want a delightful shopping experience, you go to Habitat. And pay the premium to hear "ma'am" and get your white china mugs wrapped in diamond encrusted silky paper. Double layer. And you pay.

mrsbabookaloo So it's you that does it, is it? It's Friday, and I'm slightly homicidal after a week of picking up and putting back away assorted piles of crap that customers inexplicably dump in random piles through out the store.

FWIW, did you know the internal nickname for Croydon IKEA is 'The Beast'? It's notoriously difficult to work in (I think it's fine tbh - been threatened far less here than other places)

Also, maybe a bit late for some of you, and I don't know if other stores are doing it, but for today and this weekend, to 'celebrate' the new catalogue, Family card holders get a free breakfast. Even I'm going in to get one (despite being there last night, and back in again this evening!)

Oh and OP, don't be scared. We're lovely really. Honest.

I don't even think that Habitat is what it was :(

What time does brekkers finish serenity? Have I got time to go to music group first? :o

The Habitat near me moved to an out-of-town place and was replcaed by a superposh triple-wrapped in golf-leaf tissue-paper kind of shop. Clement Joscelyn. That's the name. They are lovely to you even if you just go in to buy a birthday card and coo over the stupidly expensive things.

Croydon IKEA isn't too bad to get to - if you're coming from the south, sit in the eft hand lane of the Purley Way all the way up (but not in the slip lane at the annoying lights just after the fiveways junction), ignore the actual IKEA entrance, and turn at the cinema/B&Q sign. Much easier that way.

Getting out is a nightmare though as you need ot know which lane you need to be in to exit the big roundabout (I'm the irritating one who sits in the left lane all the way ).

We went to the Thurrock IKEA the other week, and it's laid out all differently, was very confusing. But they have self scan checkouts which was rather exciting.

YANBU, I'm always scared to go to IKEA because I always end up with a trolley full of unecessary plastic objects in my trolley!

I love Clement joscelyne, the smell is gorgeous.

In my trolley, trolley, trolley!!! I'm off my ........

I don't believe any wall lamp is so good it warrants a trip across the water to buy it, OP. What if it's out of stock?

Can't any MNer that's going today get her the lamp and send it to her, it would save the environment! It sounds like a nightmare to get to, and I know that obsessive feeling that I MUST HAVE THAT LAMP!

Ikea is one of the circles of hell. There are other places to buy lamps...

QS - why would you expect a Finn in Finland to speak English? Are you going to speak Finnish to them when they visit your country?

Which poster was it that referred to IKEA as being like childbirth. She needs to get on here and remind me of it, was very funny.

If you are an IKEA virgin I advise that you stick to the arrows and just go with the flow only the seasoned IKEA shopper can successfully slip past certain sections without getting lost.

Mingg - that is hardly the point, this is about the hardship you go through when shopping in Ikea, not a general complaint about peopls lacking English skills! I stated a FACT - none of them spoke English, so I had a communication problem, I did not say I expected them to speak English.

I think you might appreciate this song.

I love the Lakeside one m'self. Can't go too often as funds don't permit. (Shirley had it so right about the tealights!)

I loathe Ikea. It is a dump.

I went to the coventry one a couple of weeks ago, the place seemed full of inanely grinning robots holding aloft yellow carrier bags.

I only went in there to buy cushions. After a futile search for Gurddjen insert to fit in the Stiegg cushion cover (never did find it) I gave up, though fuck this for a game of soldiers, and went to John lewis.

Had lunch in the cafe, as had heard good things, and thought it was utterly vile. How empty does your life have to be that a hideous lunch and a dime bar cake served in a concrete floored Prisoner Cell Block H style canteen is seen as a treat?

I so want to go to a shop called Clement Joscelyne.

I spend a lot of time money in CH GOML... very very very nice.

DH has banned me from returning without him.

I have beds, sofas, carpets, all sorts of yummmmmmy stuff from there. . Hence my addiction had to be broken.

Just had a look at Clement Joscelyne

Bloody hell though the shops are on the other side of the world (am in west country).