We went to Ikea today. Pronounced I-kee-ah; not Hawaiian style I-kay-ah. My niece & her boyfriend are visiting Arizona from Kona. Who knew that a furniture type store could be a tourist destination.
The one in Arizona is relatively new. It opened last year. Before that people would rent a Uhaul and go to the San Diego Ikea. Talk about hard up. I describe Ikea as a Pottery Barn on steroids and thats putting it mildly. Ikea has more then furniture. It also has a lot other stuff. If like many American shoppers you suffer from stuffitis, then you MUST go to Ikea for more stuff and have a serious stuff shopping session.
Ikea is about as big or bigger the a SuperWalMart. It has two floors. When you go in it leads you upstairs to the showroom. The whole floor is filled with different types of bedroooms, kitchens, living rooms, bathrooms, whatever kine of room. Its all set up with all the pieces and accessories they sell. After the different types of rooms you come upon all the beds or chairs. Like there will be nothing but couches, then beds, dressers, cabinets, chairs, bookshelves or lightening. Thats all the upstairs.
Then you go downstairs and thats when you start filling your bag, cart or flatbed. As you shop around the show room there are also things you can pick up to purchase. The furniture is reasonably priced. It is packaged in a box. Sooooo, its good to go and get hauled away in a car or truck whatever. YOU have to put it together when you get home. So like if you buy a dresser, its packed in a flat box. You get home and gotta screw’um togedda.
Myself, I’m not good at screwing. Things together! I am mechanically challenged and proud of it. I read the instructions and I look at da pieces and I am lost just reading. A lot of times, I don’t get it. I’m not “tool” oriented. *L*
But there is much more stuff then furniture there. There is cookware, kitchen gadgets, dishes both regular kine and fancy smancy kine. They have a lot of cute kids stuff. They have cool storage ideas; baskets & shelves and more baskets and more shelves. They have art work and frames, rugs and fake flowas and plants. I tell you they are loaded with stuff.
I don’t think Hawaii needs Ikea. They have WalMart, KMart and Costco and all kinds of stores with stuff. People basically don’t need stuff, they just want stuff. Or is that me. Yeah, its US. I don’t think Hawaii can handle an Ikea, its a big ass store. Its size alone is bigger then Kunia or Pomoho. LOL
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September 18th, 2005 at 11:05 pm
I agree with you…we don’t have the room but what a delight it would be to have a store like IKEA! I would go there everyday just to ke’e'a! *L*
Lynn
September 19th, 2005 at 6:35 am
There was talk of placing an IKEA in Honolulu a few years back, but I was told that they decided against it. Similar to the idea that they decided not to place one in Seattle, and then a group of guys got together and bought the only franchised IKEA to put here in Seattle. Now, it’s one of the highest selling IKEAs in the country. IKEA does have lots of stuff, but they are great if you are trying to remodel a home with good product on a budget.