IKEA’s Utah Store Gets a Reaction

May 29, 2007  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in Furniture Retailing on May 2007 A report in the Daily Herald of Central Utah says area retailers are gearing up to compete with the IKEA store that opened May 23 in Draper, the Swedish retailer/manufacturer’s first location in the state.

The article cited aggressive campaigns among local furniture stores that range from alleged anti-IKEA television ads to hosting a Provo casting call for the reality television series “The Bachelor.”

“IKEA definitely means do-it-yourself. They’re the biggest peddler of junk besides Wal-Mart,” I.M. Home Founder Craig Knott told the newspaper. I.M. Home hosted a casting call for “The Bachelor” to boost foot traffic to his store. “My wife and I shopped at IKEA when we lived in Chicago. We got some furniture like dressers, beds. Not one piece survived the move back to Utah.”

“Once people realize they have to put everything together, and the furniture doesn’t last, the allure will pass.”

Joseph Roth, director of public affairs for IKEA North America, responded in the report that IKEA has good furniture at affordable prices, and a successful track record worldwide.

Recent adds by R.C. Willey depict a child resisting his father’s efforts to help assemble furniture, but President Jeff Child told the Daily Herald, the ads are not “anti-IKEA.”

“Our ad campaigns were planned long before IKEA arrived,” Child said in the report. “We don’t compete head-on with IKEA, other than in Sacramento, where we both have stores. Their furniture is fairly inexpensive and customers have to put it together. We don’t really do that kind of furniture.”