Tuesday, December 19, 2006

I Love You Ikea...but...

I spend the majority of my afternoon yesterday building the small six drawer ALEX storage unit from Ikea. Now Ikea prides themselves on their simple process for building their furniture that uses no tools other than the allan key provided and takes no time at all. Or so they say, my experience was not quite like this. After opening the box and sorting out the various parts, i started to assemble. I quickly discovered that i needed not only a flat head and phillips screwdriver but also a hammer and a drill.
Now i have been known in the past to be quite handy with assembling various Ikea items, ask my uncle who gave up after a 5 hour attempt and passed off his L shape office desk to me at which point i managed to assemble it in a mere 2 hours. Or my mum who watched me work away at my 7 foot loft style bed (that ended up being too tall for my room, but none the less was a successful build). However this little unit just wouldn't go together. As i sat in the corner of my office trying as quietly as possible to build the unit while not interrupting my colleges conference calls and internal meetings, it came clear to me that Ikea has definitely gone down hill with the design of their products. Look and Feel may still be there, however when designing, the Sweeds have evidently forgotten to prioritize the customer experience when building various Ikea units.
I love you Ikea but you nearly killed me yesterday.

1 comment:

N Shurr said...

I want that glass that you can write on from ikea...only a bigger version