When I received this invitation, I was overjoyed. Because I was supposed to be one of the first dozen or so journalists to be allowed into IKEA’s secret research and development center. What I saw exceeded my wildest expectations. I even considered quitting my current job and immediately taking a job there.
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Let’s start from the beginning. Secret center IKEA is located in Zbąszyn (Greater Poland), at Sportowa Street, entrance from the street Gymnastic. These are called Manufacturing Development Centers, or MDC for short. GPS coordinates: 52.25240558980839, 15.928017239553741.
There are two such centers in the world: one in Sweden, the other in Zbąszyń. The location is not accidental. It is in neighboring Zbąszynek a huge factory complex this Swedish giant. And what engineers do in Zbąszyń has a direct impact on what comes out of the production lines.
I expected to have to leave it at first telephone in a padlocked box and sign a commitment that if I disclosed too much data or published a photo taken from the hip, they would make another life out of me Swedish Deluge. It turned out that a sincere and persistent request not to take photos was enough. Trust. AND I respect that. And now I’m telling you what I saw, because I didn’t take any photos. The ones you will find in the text are “official”.
The entrance to the halls and workshops is right next to the designers’ desks. And they are ruled by people who can quickly (even in a few hours!) make a prototype of a new piece of furniture or improve an existing one. And what they do will affect the whole world. And this has serious consequences.
IKEA tortures furniture
One of the rooms of the secret IKEA center is sala torture. Imagine several cabinets with a mechanical arm constantly opening and closing the doors. Every few seconds. One cabinet has doors, the second has sliding doors, the third has drawers. And slot machines for a few days They open and close these doors and drawers all the timeopen and close.
You can stare at it for hours. Three days to be exact, because that’s how long a standard test takes. IKEA also has a furniture line that comes with a 25-year warranty. Then the test is longer. It lasts a month, during which time the doors are opened and closed 200,000 times. This looks exciting until…
Until you see a double bed with a machine with a powerful mechanical arm every few seconds tries to break the headboard. There’s a pop, the board creaks, but doesn’t let go. Pop, again. At the same time, a weight weighing over 100 kilograms is lowered onto the bed. There are also those that weigh much more.
This is the result of very different regulations in different countries around the world. In some we are talking about static weightin others about impacts, the weight (or impact force) that a given piece of furniture must withstand also differs.
There is furniture with weights placed all around. There are dozens of them, probably thousands of weights. Engineers carefully study, for example the top of the dresser will be deformedif we put 50 kilos of metal on it per month.
But this is just the introduction. Because there are also in the secret IKEA research center in Zbąszyń chambers that simulate different climatic conditions. “Southeast Asia” and “India” were opened especially for us. These are small rooms with armored doors and a round window. They contain various pieces of furniture with weights.
It’s in “Asia”. 28 degrees and 85 percent humidity. Pleasant for the first 5 seconds, then you feel the heat and humidity more and more clearly. In “India” it is even worse: 35 degrees and 95 percent. humidity. A lot, it’s not pleasant here even for a moment.
Engineers explain that their furniture in India has really difficult conditions. Also because of this how floors are washed in this country. We soak the mop, wring it out and then wipe it across the floor. In India, water is usually poured on the floor first and then mopped. Furniture legs therefore stand in water and then dry out difficultly.
And how to simulate it? You guessed it: by placing the tested furniture in containers of water.
The whole thing looks like a dream job, doesn’t it?
So listen to this: people from IKEA say that they ruin a lot of furniture coffee, wine, drinks. They dream about them markers and crayons.
One of the biggest challenges for engineers is the North American market and chests of drawers. It turns out that no law can force you Americans do attaching furniture to the wall. Even if they have such a recommendation in the instructions and do not follow it, the falling piece of furniture is the manufacturer’s fault.
W Europe it’s different: you don’t attach it, you are responsible for it yourself. At the same time, every parent knows how dangerous a chest of drawers can be if a little person uses it as a staircase to climb. AND children in every longitude and latitude have such aspirations. Therefore, research is being carried out in the secret center on “difficult to tip over” chests of drawers.
They have already found that the chest of drawers remains stable when the drawn drawer is loaded with more than 35 kilograms. They also have another way for little Americans. This is the patent that it doesn’t allow you to open more than one at a time chest of drawers. If you want to open another one, close the first one first.
And they say that all furniture must be tested for “inappropriate use”.
– We know that a table is meant to sit at. But we know that customers do different things on it, contrary to its original purpose. We have to predict this, says one of the engineers. Unfortunately, they did not show how they check the durability of the furniture in terms of situations… not in line with its intended use. But what can you do on the kitchen table? Guess what.
From the computer to the factory
Highly qualified carpenters also work in the secret center in Zbąszyń. They have different but equally responsible tasks. They are great craftsmen who create what the designers imagined.
– It often happened that a designer came to us with drawings. At 4 or 5 p.m. we were finishing work on virtual endurance tests, i.e. work with computers. A in the morning he found the furniture ready in the office – say people from IKEA. It should also be added that employees do not have full freedom in choosing techniques and materials. They have to exploit exactly the same materials and processes production, what in factory.
They receive drawings, tools and other MDF boards. Within a few hours, they turn them into ready-made furniture that looks almost as if it came straight off the production line. The differences are for the layman almost invisible and rely mainly on the quality of the finish.
I also can’t tell you what finished furniture I’ve seen in this factory, but this one I really liked the table and stand.
IKEA in Poland
People from IKEA also revealed some details about the company. In Poland employ a total of over 17,000 people. An additional 75,000 work in companies with the so-called supply chain. Last year, the company paid PLN 180 million in income tax, invested PLN 530 million and exported furniture worth PLN 12 billion.
In Poland 23% is produced. all furniture IKEA around the world. The company has 16 own factories and 79 suppliers. 93% come from Poland. Eket cabinets, 71 percent Valevåg mattresses, 92 percent Glimm candles, 67 percent Vimle and 56 percent Strandmon seats and 65 percent furniture from the Kallax series and 49 percent from the Vimnes series.
500 trucks full of furniture leave one factory in Zbąszynek every day. 5.5 percent production goes to Poland, the rest goes to export. Mainly to Germany, the United States and Great Britain. It is produced in Poland 90 percent legendary Lack tables. It is not known whether they are used inappropriately. This was not revealed to us.
They were supposed to be white, are they blue? Here’s the explanation
But I learned that before making plans for the evening, carefully familiarize yourself with the assembly time of a given piece of furniture.
– A young man once came to the store to buy a bed. He said he already had a bottle of wine and invited his fiancée. It was about 4 p.m. I saw the disappointment in his eyes when I told him that he had chosen a bed that takes almost 5 hours to turn.This is the most difficult piece of furniture to assemble. And after unfolding, the mattress will become elastic within 24 hours – one of the IKEA managers tells us.
Further anecdotes from this company concern people who call with complaints about what they ordered white furniture for the kitchen, but it arrived blue. It’s all because of the blue protective foil that covers the furniture fronts. But the world record was broken by a client who, a few years after purchasing a kitchen, came to complain that the paint was peeling off his furniture.
It turned out that the protective foil was coming off and he didn’t remove it. “They were supposed to be white, but I waved it off because the blue one looked good too,” he confessed. But thanks to this, after several years of using the furniture, the fronts were in “factory new” condition.
2023-12-11 11:53:04
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