Society Made Me Do It
March 5th, 2006
Ikea opened a new store in Sacramento this week, and my roommate Raymond and I took a trip over there to check it out at pick up a few things.
It was a very eventful trip, beginning with the huge line of cars trying to find a parking space. While Ikea had a good idea hiring staff to park the thousands of patrons as economically as possible, I feel I could have found a space much quicker, and closer, without them. After following the trail all the way around the parking lot and back out again, we were finally parked in a nearby industrial complex, and were forced to walk half a mile to the store entrance.
Once inside, there were no lack of people. I was much like navigating through a crowded theme park. People everywhere, and going in all directions without regard to courtesy or protocol. After “shopping” for over 2 hours, Raymond and I finally came to the final stretch. We could see the checkout lines, and we had but one more stop to make. I needed to grab a desk chair from the warehouse area. We parked out now full cart at the end of the aisle, as it was a little crowded. We looked for the right parts, only to find that one of the essential parts were out of stock. We turn around and notice……our cart is gone! I run toward the checkout stand to see if someone has mistakenly taken it, to no avail. Raymond runs the opposite direction to see if he can spot it. Finally, we ask one of the Ikea staff if they pick up abandoned carts. They told us they had taken our cart to the back to restock the stuff in it. This is after we left it at the end of the isle, for no more than 1 minute! He tryed to retrieve it, but most of the items were removed from it.
So now we have half the things we were shopping for, and we go back to try and fill it again. We only get about a quarter of the way, when Ikea staff stops us and tells us the store is closing. We explain our situation, and one of the staff very reluctantly agrees to allow me to get a few key items. She follows me to grab dish towels, and a couple of glasses, not allowing me to grab the slippers I had seen.
Finally, we make it to line, which takes about 20 minutes to check out. Then we line up for the 50 cent hot dogs, only to be told to leave when we sit down to eat them. I fill out a comment card on the way out, just to let them know how I feel, and that their lasso berry soda is amazing! Now, we walk outside and the huge parking lot, which we could not get a spot in earlier is COMPLETELY EMPTY. We walk the half mile through an empty parking lot to my car was out in the cuts.All in all a pretty negative experience, but I feel it was a rather uniquely bad experience that I’m not likely to have to go through again. Just an unfortunate series of events.
Ikea opened a new store in Sacramento this week, and my roommate Raymond and I took a trip over there to check it out at pick up a few things.
It was a very eventful trip, beginning with the huge line of cars trying to find a parking space. While Ikea had a good idea hiring staff to park the thousands of patrons as economically as possible, I feel I could have found a space much quicker, and closer, without them. After following the trail all the way around the parking lot and back out again, we were finally parked in a nearby industrial complex, and were forced to walk half a mile to the store entrance.
Once inside, there were no lack of people. I was much like navigating through a crowded theme park. People everywhere, and going in all directions without regard to courtesy or protocol. After “shopping” for over 2 hours, Raymond and I finally came to the final stretch. We could see the checkout lines, and we had but one more stop to make. I needed to grab a desk chair from the warehouse area. We parked out now full cart at the end of the aisle, as it was a little crowded. We looked for the right parts, only to find that one of the essential parts were out of stock. We turn around and notice……our cart is gone! I run toward the checkout stand to see if someone has mistakenly taken it, to no avail. Raymond runs the opposite direction to see if he can spot it. Finally, we ask one of the Ikea staff if they pick up abandoned carts. They told us they had taken our cart to the back to restock the stuff in it. This is after we left it at the end of the isle, for no more than 1 minute! He tryed to retrieve it, but most of the items were removed from it.
So now we have half the things we were shopping for, and we go back to try and fill it again. We only get about a quarter of the way, when Ikea staff stops us and tells us the store is closing. We explain our situation, and one of the staff very reluctantly agrees to allow me to get a few key items. She follows me to grab dish towels, and a couple of glasses, not allowing me to grab the slippers I had seen.
Finally, we make it to line, which takes about 20 minutes to check out. Then we line up for the 50 cent hot dogs, only to be told to leave when we sit down to eat them. I fill out a comment card on the way out, just to let them know how I feel, and that their lasso berry soda is amazing! Now, we walk outside and the huge parking lot, which we could not get a spot in earlier is COMPLETELY EMPTY. We walk the half mile through an empty parking lot to my car was out in the cuts.
All in all a pretty negative experience, but I feel it was a rather uniquely bad experience that I’m not likely to have to go through again. Just an unfortunate series of events.
I’m really torn on how exactly I feel about Ikea. Part of me respects them for some of the environmentally friendly things they do, like pushing energy saving light bulbs, and offering reusable shopping bags. The other part of me hates them for some of the cheap crap they make, and the rampant consumerism that goes on there. Seriously though, I couldn’t help but be disgusted as I was fighting the masses of people hearding through the maze of product displays like a mouse trying to get to the cheese. To spend money. Everyone there flocked to Ikea because it was a new place to spend, spend, spend. It’s coded into us as a society. We love to spend money, and Ikea is just another place we can do it, and assemble it ourselves. It’s like Disneyland for these people. The only thing that disgusted me more was the fact that I was there for the very same reason. I flocked there just like everyone else, and I’m probably going back tomorrow. Society made me do it.
Leave a Reply