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On Monday, IKEA Charlotte held yet another ceremony leading to the Grand Opening of IKEA Charlotte, the first IKEA in the Carolinas.  This ceremony was to open the temporary entrance to IKEA which would allow drivers to turn right from University City Boulevard to North Tyron Street. An actual intersection will be built in the future during phase two of the traffic reengineering.

Unfortunately, noone told the tractor trailer driver that the road wasn’t open quite yet before he smashed through the ribbon.  Noone was hurt.

I wonder…did they actually CUT the ribbon after that? Or did they pack up their scissors and go home?

Inter-IKEA Systems B.V. along with the municipality of Delft planted 109 trees of 20-30cm width and an ecological bank was established for local wildlife. Solar panels installed on the hotel assist with the water heating.

The Tulip Inn Delft will embody an innovative, three-star hotel concept called “from staying to living”. The aim of this concept lies in creating home-like comfort for the guests. It will offer accommodation to the thousands of IKEA co-workers who are visiting the IKEA Concept Center as well as to other guests. It will also offer a natural meeting point for both business and leisure visitors while displaying IKEA know-how in interior design.

The hotel will consist of 140 rooms, of which 116 single and double rooms, 17 studios and 7 handicapped-accessible rooms. Further, it will comprise a bar, well equipped meeting and training rooms, a library, a multi-function break-out area, a fitness centre with sauna, a courtyard and an outside terrace.

[Link via IKEA Fans, from Taxi]

Amid all the public excitement over Ikea’s Winnipeg plan is a danger that those high expectations have so far to fall.

Considering this city’s record on infrastructure renewal and paving the way for development, that risk is very real. The international home furnishings retail giant’s arrival here is certainly not a done deal, as long as more than $20 million in street expansions and traffic signal improvements are necessary for the chain to open its proposed 350,000-square-foot outlet within three years.

While the city and province speak confidently about giving Ikea Canada the infrastructure it needs, the company’s chosen site at Kenaston Boulevard and Sterling Lyon Parkway is in a district seemingly symbolic of intergovernmental bumbling, disagreement and delay. Remember the Doer government’s years of stalling on Kenaston’s $38-million underpass at Wilkes Avenue during city hall’s efforts to get it done? How about the city’s amusing trumpeting last year of the very same south Route 90 as an example of its supposedly speedy progress to allegedly synchronize signal lights?

And we’re to expect that a widening of Kenaston is so easy in light of these stumbles, and while we continue to wait for Ottawa — after five years or so — to say anything at all about what will become of the massive, vacant Kapyong Barracks? Throw in a requirement for a change to Plan Winnipeg — a cumbersome document if ever there were one — and the hype over Ikea’s hopes here poses better prospects of a letdown than the Save the Jets Campaign in 1995.

And we all know how that turned out.

For Mayor Sam Katz and Premier Gary Doer, this situation is ripe for their embarrassment and for their constituents’ outrage — particularly because Winnipeg’s fiercely small-town, anti-development attitude gives no such major ultra-urban project an easy green light.

“As much as they say they’re coming, I don’t ever believe they actually will,” Jo-Anna Watts, one Winnipeg consumer, wisely said of Ikea after the firm’s announcement.

And University of Manitoba business analyst Rob Warren, who has long questioned Ikea’s viability in Winnipeg, says he’s not changing his opinion “until I see a shovel in the ground.” This is the beginning of a development covering 1.5 million square feet, in a city that makes three-storey apartment buildings and tiny strip malls a massive undertaking amid a fuss of acrimony and finger-pointing.

We’re not even at the public open house stage. And Ikea’s largest Canadian superstore is on its way here?

Sure it is — when we see not only a shovel in the ground but its doors wide open.

[Via Winnipeg Sun]

See also:

Despite hype, locals seem somewhat ‘meh’ about IKEA coming to Manitoba

Who would say no to IKEA…

What do you think?  Are you excited about IKEA in Winnipeg?  Do you think it will actually happen?  Will the current state of the faltering economy impact IKEA’s plans to build in Winnipeg?

Four mothers in the UK were ejected from the IKEA cafeteria in Bletchley and later received an official apology from both from IKEA management in Sweden and the local store manager.  Why?  Perhaps because not everyone understands homeschooling.

The four homeschooling families have been in the habit of meeting every Monday in the IKEA cafeteria for coffee and a quiet play session, consisting of board and card games and other quiet activities. Recently 6 IKEA co-workers confronted the group and they were ejected from the store for reasons varying from taking up too much room (the cafeteria was 1/2 empty) to bringing outside food (two moms brought food for their babies) and even the highly dubious statement that the kids games were “gambling” and against store rules. One of the co-workers said:  ”I don’t see much education going on.”

One of the mom’s involved, Shoshana Toothill, started an email campaign urging other homeschoolers to boycott IKEA as well as emailing IKEA representatives in Almhult.  Last week the mothers involved were invited back to meet with the store manager: ”He was very, very nice. He apologised and was very positive and encouraging. He said mums and children were core Ikea customers and we were welcome any time.”

So.

The irony? The co-worker that didn’t see “much education going on” was in FACT teaching a very important lesson at that very moment: People sometimes make mistakes, simply because of their perspective at the moment that they make a decision.

IKEA has a very deeply entrenched policy of being a family friendly store, but despite that, the co-workers involved saw a group monopolizing tables and not buying much.  I’m willing to bet that the store manager saw a group of 4 mothers that make a habit of coming into his store every week, which is exactly what any manager would want.

In any case as fellow homeschoolers, we’d like to say kudos to Shoshana of Galley Hill! And thanks to Sally Murrer and the Milton Keynes Citizen for the original article: Play ban lifted, on the orders of Ikea’s big boss

BERLIN, Dec. 8 (UPI) — The head of Swedish furniture company Ikea’s German wing says women excel over their male counterparts when it comes to assembling the company’s goods..Petra Hesser, 50, Ikea’s German chief, said women are better skilled at assembling the company’s signature flatback furniture because “men never look at the directions and have the most problems with construction because they always think they can do that,” The Local reported Monday.

“The woman first sorts the parts in an orderly way. Men throw them in a pile and then,something goes missing,” she said. “That is empirically proven.”

Hesser estimated that women make up 40 percent of the furniture giant’s customer base, but men often accompany their female friends and family to give approval for larger purchases.

However, “if the woman is against buying something, then nothing gets done,” she said.

Wow.  That’s quite a statement!  What do you think? Are women better than men at assembling IKEA furniture?  Speak out!

Via UPI.com

Ikea is to become the UK’s first major retailer to regularly charge customers for plastic bags, to try and tackle waste and environmental damage.

The Swedish firm will charge shoppers 5p for every bag with immediate effect, rising to 10p in September.

It believes the move – accompanied by a switch to biodegradable bags and lower prices for reusable bags – will cut total bag use by 20 million next year.

The Environment Agency praised the move as a “great example” to other firms.

BBC NEWS

Link

ARCHBOLD – By mid-year, Sauder Woodworking Co. plans to start manufacturing frames and shelves for kitchen cabinetry sold by the Sweden-based home-furnishings retailer Ikea, under a contract Kevin Sauder, president and chief executive officer, said he hopes will be “the first of many.”

Mr. Sauder said the contract, announced yesterday, resulted from seven months of working with Ikea on specifications for the components, made until now in Eastern Europe.

The additional work won’t boost the firm’s employment of about 2,800 in the Archbold area, but it will stabilize the work force, said Mr. Sauder.

“It’s an excellent new relationship,” he said. “I think it’s just the beginning.”

toledoblade.com

Related link: Sauder Corporate Site
[Thanks Jen!]

“As Dublin closes in on its 25th birthday, the city continues to grow demographically and economically, Mayor Janet Lockhart said.

At the annual State of the City address, delivered Wednesday, Lockhart told business and city leaders that in the past 10 years Dublin’s revenue from property tax has increased by 400 percent. Revenue from sales tax has risen 92 percent during the same time, and the population jumped from 25,544 to 41,907, Lockhart said….

The city has suffered a loss last year when Ikea decided not to build,” Hildenbrand said, reading Lockhart’s speech.

Blake Hunt Ventures, the development firm that originally planned to build a “lifestyle center” next to Ikea, has agreed to purchase Ikea’s property to add to its project. Those plans are expected to come before the City Council in the early part of this year, and the project may be built by the end of 2009.”

Valley Times
Pleasanton, California
January 18, 2007

[Thanks to Penandra Pennington]

Swedish furniture retailer IKEA is buying 70 acres in Frederickson from
the Port of Tacoma, with plans to build a distribution center that will
serve IKEA stores in Washington, Oregon, Utah and the Canadian
provinces of Alberta and British Columbia.

The Port of Tacoma commission on Tuesday approved the sale of the
property – on the northeast corner of 38th Avenue East and 200th Street
East – to IKEA for $8.66 million.

Derrick Urquhart, the port’s manager of industrial real estate, said
the distribution center will create 150 jobs and drive more imported
cargo through the port. The distribution center also will add some
diversity to the port’s Frederickson Industrial Area, which now houses
mostly manufacturers such as The Boeing Co., Toray Composites of
America and Northwest Door, Urquhart said.

Frederickson’s location was the draw for IKEA.

By Kelly Kearsley
The News Tribune

[via Jen]