"A dream in the making" Ikea to sell used furniture online

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Originally published at: "A dream in the making" Ikea to sell used furniture online - Boing Boing

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I’ve actually picked up a few pieces in the local store’s scratch and dent/returns section at a good discount.

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I had a friend who liked to make “new” furniture out of the stuff from scratch/dents/returns section, and made pretty cool stuff at that. For a website that (at least at one point) was a maker haven, the mocking tone seems a little off.

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Used furniture in general can be a great deal and sustainable choice! Used Ikea furniture specifically makes me shudder with the thought of disintegrating particle board, water-swollen panels and delaminating melamine…

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There was a time when a lot of Ikea furniture was made with real wood. Depending on the item, some of the used stuff could be better quality than what they are currently selling.

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I wonder what their disinfection protocol is.

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A lot of their furniture is literally made out of cardboard now, so it won’t be long before we’re all pining for the bygone days when Ikea furniture was made from real compressed wood particles…

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The idea of expanding the availability of used pieces seems perfectly viable; but it’s hard to not slip into a tone somewhere between ‘mocking’ and ‘openly contemptuous’ when some suit is talking about selling used products as well as new ones in terms of it being an ‘advanced and cool’ capability founded on confidence in ‘evolving on digital’.

There are, certainly, details of CRM and logistics to be optimized more or less indefinitely; but this guy is talking like being able to handle a different kind of return process is a fundamental result in computer science or something.

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I have always dreamed of buying furniture that is already falling apart from regular use.

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This would make sense to me if IKEA is refurbishing the furniture so it is in better condition, hope that’s the case

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I had to check and see if it was April Fool’s Day.

Maybe they will buy non-Ikea used furniture and sell Ikea new furniture?

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Anna på Grönkulla?

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What they really need to create is an aftermarket sales venue for all the parts and tools leftover after assembling the furniture.

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Here, in lovely Venice of America, it is customary for the many frequently moving in and out of tiny yet expensive studio apartments LA dreamseekers to leave their IKEA and other flat-pack stuff on the sidewalk or in the street when moving out. It’d be easy to break it down and put it in the trash, but there is some fallacy where people believe someone else wants or can use it. The stuff becomes sawdust and wet paper very fast.

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I think it depends, i have some IKEA furniture that survived several challenging apartment moves and are still in great condition. On my last move some did get ruined and fell apart but that had more to do with the movers not caring and jostling it way too much when moving it :rage:

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This is entirely dependent on the price point. The IKEA catalog is not a monolith.

At the cheap end, it’ll be cardboard. In the low middle, some type of compressed wood and structured cardboard fill. In the high middle, all compressed wood of some type. At the more expensive end, it will be solid wood. Sometimes with cheaper and more expensive solid wood options.

The ability to move something along with how long it is likely to last in general is directly related to which price level the item comes from.

Obviously, none if it is craftsman furniture. Someone planning to live in an apartment for year has different needs than someone planning to live in a house for the next decade plus.

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If I wanted to avoid adding to landfill and didn’t want to go through online selling hassle, I could put a bookcase out on the pavement/sidewalk with a sign and somebody would often come and take it. If it is dismantled nobody will touch it (because who knows if all the bits are there), but it probably won’t fit in a car, so I tape the allen key (from a large stock) to the item.

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Here if it is very nice someone will take it. If it is only moderately nice, someone will throw it around the streets and break it into bits. If it is trash, a neighbor will spray paint something close to witty on it. After a while someone will 311 call it in and LA San will come get it.

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That’s a shame. I have scavenged and modified some good things over the years.