There are few things in life more stressful in life than furniture shopping with your partner, except maybe attempting to navigate an IKEA showroom with your partner.
Thousands of furniture choices, a tight confined space… it’s a recipe for disaster that we all continue to put our selves through because DAMN IT, we love those Swedish flat-packed products.
Without a doubt IKEA employees have been privy to more than one emotional breakdown in store, and in a new Reddit thread, employees have been sharing the worst family meltdowns they’ve seen … which are equal parts hilarious and terrifying.
Take a look below.
The ULTIMATE IKEA breakdown
This was my Ikea family meltdown. My then-boyfriend and I were getting our own place just after university.
Things start off ok. We start with lunch, admire the living room couches, move into kitchen wares. All so far enjoyable fantasy. And then we reach our destination, bedrooms. A sea of beds in a variety of price points greet us with brightly coloured duvets. An experienced furniture purchaser I start scanning the price tags to narrow the options. I bring him to an attractive, affordable model I think matches some of our bookcases. And this is where the trouble starts.
See up until now, I didn’t realise exactly how bad this man’s fear of decision making was. He stares at the bed incomprehensibly for literal minutes, refusing to talk about it. Eventually, it is discovered that buying a bed means committing to delaying graduate school, never moving to the east coast, and having children with me. I don’t understand that logic and request explanation which is slowly and tearfully given.
We spent three hours in that Ikea and left with nothing. About a month later we went back and again after several hours bought that exact bed. He never went to grad school or moved to the east coast. We also did not have children and broke up a few years later. He took the bed.
Yes, but where is IKEA?
I used to work in IKEA in my student days, the Glasgow, Scotland store.
When it was newly opened an elderly Irish guy, and his wife stopped me and asked where IKEA was, I explained that they were in IKEA and they couldn’t understand.
They had arrived at the ferry port in Ireland that morning and decided that they’d go on a day trip to somewhere they hadn’t been before. When they arrived at the port in Scotland, there was a dedicated ‘IKEA’ bus. They thought IKEA was an actual place in Scotland and didn’t realise it was a shop.
I walked away trying not to wet myself laughing as I could hear them blaming each other for the mistake!
Well THIS is awkward…
Currently in an Ikea making the most of my complimentary cups of tea.
The couple at the next table over just had a brilliant argument about whether or not they could put a TV in their bathroom. He thinks it will fit, wife/girlfriend thinks it’s the stupidest idea ever, they don’t need it, it won’t fit and if he wants to do that then he can move back in with his mother. He keeps asking her to give him half of her Daim cake. After about five minutes of whining she told him if wanted some he should have bought one because apparently he always does this.
Later I saw them again and he was ‘playfully’ throwing pillows at her to get her attention. She turned around and said (scarily calmly) “I know that you think you’re being funny, but you’re not. So if you’re going to act like a child I will treat you like a child. Start behaving like an adult or we’ll leave now and I’ll take away your Xbox for a week.” He pouted and marched off, muttering under his breath.
IKEA lady, if you’re out there, I hope he grows up and also I really like the peacock blue pillow you bought.
The competition was fierce
Two words. Black Friday (big sale day in the states).
It was 9:55, we open at 10. We were almost done, all that we had left to do was put out some children’s kitchen set. What we didn’t realise was that it was 50% off.
I only had two pallets left to put out when the store opens, and the horde came.
They were crazy. Sprinting, pushing and shoving. They fought to get to these kitchens, and when they noticed my pallets, they tore them open and took it. Eventually, one woman started screaming and attacked the guy who took the last one off of the pallet, not noticing the two full pallets. I had to pull her off him and security came. After about 10 minutes the chaos ended, and I cleaned up.
At that point, an elderly couple came and asked if there were any kitchens left and I put one in their cart as my coworkers and I laughed at what had just occurred.
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