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Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

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Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#41

Post by ghaff »

niftich wrote: post #39
TylerE wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The store build-out on this model may be done, at least in the US. It most definitely is NOT. For instance the nearest Ikea to the Raleigh/Triangle area is over 2 hours away. There are 24 US states without a single Ikea store.

They have recently began a large wave of expansion [1] in the US. Raleigh (Cary) is getting one soon. So is Norfolk, Nashville, Jacksonville, Columbus OH, Milwaukee; they're also beginning to build second (or additional) locations in large metros like Chicago, DFW, Phoenix. [1] http://www.ikea.com/us/en/about_ikea/newsroom/expansion_plan...

They were trying to add a second store in the Boston area for a long time but they finally gave up on trying to get one into Somerville. (There was a lot of local opposition--mostly because of traffic concerns as I recall.) AFAIK, there's no current plan to add another store. The existing one is a fair ways south of the city.

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#42

Post by giarc »

LeifCarrotson wrote: post #25
giarc wrote: post #18

IKEA needs to solve the problem with distance to store or shipping. More than just the "Collection Points" they are building. They need to partner with a physical brick and mortar store to ship and store product. Similar to what Amazon is going to do with Whole Foods. IKEA needs a partner like Whole Foods where users can pick up their product. Currently buying anything on IKEA and having it shipped is super costly, a…

> Currently buying anything on IKEA and having it shipped is super costly It's definitely a problem. I'm about 3-4 hours away from the nearest Ikea. And it would cost $250 to get any large items: http://ikeadirectcatalogorder.com (Yes, that is the official site). Now, by day, I'm an engineer who builds large machines. I have a semi truck or lowboy in my parking lot weekly. I get that freight is expensive - $250 to ha…

I know of groups on Facebook where people bundle their purchases and split the shipping cost.

My sister lives in Raleigh and the closest IKEA is Charlotte. It's a 3 hour drive and they are willing to make it once or twice a year when they can. But if they could buy online and have it appear in their local grocery store I'm sure their spending would increase dramatically.

It seems like there is an opportunity for IKEA, or someone else to help get product to these people. And as I showed above, it's not only people in small towns. Raleigh is a big city and yet people have to drive 3 hours to get to the nearest IKEA.

Interestingly, while checking to make sure IKEA hadn't launched in Raleigh, I came across this little biz http://www.ncmodernfurniture.com/ikea-delivery/

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#43

Post by shimon »

jessriedel wrote: post #36
TylerE wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The store build-out on this model may be done, at least in the US. It most definitely is NOT. For instance the nearest Ikea to the Raleigh/Triangle area is over 2 hours away. There are 24 US states without a single Ikea store.

It may be that they have mostly saturated in the markets where they think they are competitive.

Perhaps. A lot of this boils down to the question of why they're expanding now and not sooner. Ikea stores are big investments and when they started rapidly expanding in the US they may not have had confidence in the long-term profitability of each store, including reliance on the housing market and taste-driven desirability of Ikea products. (What if Americans only saw Swedish furniture as a short-lived fad?)

Maybe now it's clear Ikea has a long-standing place in American retail, so in addition to expanding the giant-store footprint they want to invest in other forms of access.

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#44

Post by [deleted] »

shimon wrote: post #30

This is an interesting move, a design/manufacturing/retail company buying a labor marketplace company. Ikea has grown a ton based on having widely appealing products at extremely low prices. Their growth over the past decade has been driven by expanding their physical retail presence on the one-giant-store-per-city model. The store build-out on this model may be done, at least in the US. Still, many potential buyers…

[deleted]

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#45

Post by dopamean »

Domenic_S wrote: post #23
Spooky23 wrote: post #14

Judging from my Ikea kitchen delivery experience, I fully expect to have some dude with $20k in cabinets tied to the roof of his Honda shop up at people's houses.

Holy cow, you spent $20k on Ikea kitchen cabinets? Edit: Wow, you guys are touchy. For $20k you could get fully custom cabinets from a local shop made with cabinet-grade plywood for a typically-sized kitchen.

You guys? There's one response and it's pretty tame.

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#46

Post by justboxing »

jagger27 wrote: post #32
robterrell wrote: post #12

This is hilarious/perfect to me personally, because I have only ever used TaskRabbit to hire someone to build Ikea furniture.

TaskRabbit was cheaper than IKEA's own build service?

IKEA is almost always cheaper, but the service is horrible. They outsource the build service to local contractors and it's a hit or miss, mostly miss.

I bought a closet from IKEA and arranged the service through them. They sent 3 dudes who couldn't speak a word of english. On top of that, the 3 dudes got mad that there was no parking in San Francisco and left. So I had to call IKEA again and get them to come on a Sunday (free street parking).

The actual assembly was also sloppy. The doors weren't aligned properly, some screws were missing (making the door weaker). The left door started to come off after 2 months. Rather than call IKEA and have some other stooge come and make it worse, I looked up youtube videos on how to fix door screw holes (you use glue and wood chips) and fixed it myself.

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#47

Post by Domenic_S »

dopamean wrote: post #45
Domenic_S wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy cow, you spent $20k on Ikea kitchen cabinets? Edit: Wow, you guys are touchy. For $20k you could get fully custom cabinets from a local shop made with cabinet-grade plywood for a typically-sized kitchen.

You guys? There's one response and it's pretty tame.

I was way downvoted when I edited.

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#48

Post by Cofike »

justboxing wrote: post #46
jagger27 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TaskRabbit was cheaper than IKEA's own build service?

IKEA is almost always cheaper, but the service is horrible. They outsource the build service to local contractors and it's a hit or miss, mostly miss. I bought a closet from IKEA and arranged the service through them. They sent 3 dudes who couldn't speak a word of english. On top of that, the 3 dudes got mad that there was no parking in San Francisco and left. So I had to call IKEA again and get them to come on a Sun…

The service is absolutely abysmal.

I once had an appointment through Ikea for a few items to be delivered. It took 4 different missed appointments for them to finally deliver it. It was a nightmare. First one they never contacted us when they arrived (I live in an apartment building, no way in for non-tenants). Second one was apparently never put in the system. Same with the third one despite me calling the night before to confirm that everything went through, they even confirmed with the third party delivery service. Fourth time it finally showed up.

Would not recommend.

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#49

Post by [deleted] »

smelendez wrote: post #27
thebrettd wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kind of throwing the baby out with the bathwater here...IKEA might still be great for you as long as you avoid all the subcontracted installation services? Unless you don't know or care to turn a screwdriver, I guess! :)

Not OP, but I'm fine putting together basic IKEA furniture but don't think I would try to install kitchen cabinets myself.

[deleted]

Re: Ikea has bought TaskRabbit

#50

Post by jtuente »

niftich wrote: post #39
TylerE wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The store build-out on this model may be done, at least in the US. It most definitely is NOT. For instance the nearest Ikea to the Raleigh/Triangle area is over 2 hours away. There are 24 US states without a single Ikea store.

They have recently began a large wave of expansion [1] in the US. Raleigh (Cary) is getting one soon. So is Norfolk, Nashville, Jacksonville, Columbus OH, Milwaukee; they're also beginning to build second (or additional) locations in large metros like Chicago, DFW, Phoenix. [1] http://www.ikea.com/us/en/about_ikea/newsroom/expansion_plan...

The one is Columbus is already open.
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