Ikea UK is 21 today

[Ian H]

I have never seen the combination of good design and cheapness anywhere else. However, on the two or three occasions I've ventured into a store it's been like a claustrophobic waking nightmare.

[Greenbank]

Only been once. On a Saturday.

Bus to Wimbledon, Tram to the Croydon.
Walk round shop.
Pick stuff (big flat desk and legs, wheely chair), write down part numbers/warehouse locations.
Go find stuff in warehouse, not too tricky but several bits in the wrong place.
Through the checkout and straight over to the delivery desk.
£20 to have it all delivered the next day.
Walk out of store with just a receipt.
Hop back on the tram to Wimbledon, bus home and stopped off for a pint.

No traffic nightmare, relatively hassle free, and delivered first thing Monday morning. Whole thing done in two hours which, if attempted in a car at that time of day, we'd probably still be sitting in a queue of traffic on the A23 not having even got to the store yet.

[CAMRAMan]

So skum means the same as scum in English then except in English it has taken on a bit of a nasty connotation but it was originally the foamy bit on water.

Exactly! AFAIK, in the 12 years since I left Sweden 'skum' (correctly pronounced with a Yorkshire twang) has not taken on a negative connotation.

[Martin]

Taking one or more of their unwieldy boxes strapped to the folding bike back to East Croydon station in the evening after work is preferable to driving up at the weekend.

I was surprised to find the enormous branch near our hotel for PBP does not have a restaurant; don't they like meatballs and reindeer whangers?

[hellymedic]

IKEA went down a long way in my estimation when I bought an office chair in Neasden and their taxi desk quoted £25 to take me home, five years ago.
Friend and I (Peter Coulson, sometime AUK Events Sec) went to Tesco next door and ordered a minicab.
He charged £8.

[Martin]

Peter was on the old ACF (Hairyhippy?)

I nearly sold him a chainset

[Kathy]

When we moved house recently we spent some time in Ikea. I think our best trip was the one where we went to buy a bed, only we forgot the roofrack, and had to put it in the Corsa, which was being temperemental and only doing third gear that day.

That was a fun trip home!

[ian]

When my wife and I recently upgraded from our compact and bijou two bedroom to the expanse of a four bed house, we decided no more cheap Ikea (if you have Swedish friends, it's a constant source of wry amusement to them: "ah, Knobkrakken, you know in Swedish means much the same").

So, shopping list in hand, off to John Lewis we went. We totted up how much it would cost. And then drove to Ikea.

Probably not a bad thing, I have to say quality has always been fine. And in a house infested with clawy kittens furniture can't be too cheap.

[hellymedic]

Peter was on the old ACF (Hairyhippy?)

I nearly sold him a chainset

Mr Coulson has desisted from web fora. Other people called Peter have not.

[MattH]

Do they still sell the Skum sweets at the checkout?  Apparently they taste OK.

Isn't skum Scandiwegic for foam?

Froth, foam, or bubbles are the closest. If the choccie is Aero-like, then it's a close, though rather typically IKEA translation.

Skum is certainly how they label fire extinguishers.
But as for sweets, I prefer to eat Spunk from Denmark.

[Really Ancien]

When they first opened in Warrington the shop was a revelation, well designed cheap stuff in fairly congenial surroundings. The moment it changed was when the toilets started to be vandalised and the usual graffitti appeared, hell is other people.

Damon.