Other assembly furniture?
My husband wanted a new desk for his newly moved and painted home office. With IKEA being 7 months or 300 miles/$50 in gas away we headed to the ususal local suspects. We hit Staples first and were unimpressed. We ended up at Target buying a $55 metal desk that came with a seperate matching bookshelf, good deal. Enough so that if we find him a IKEA desk he likes during the next trip in December we're not going to second guess about replacing it.
I hear people moaning all the time about how hard IKEA stuff is to assemble, and how complicated it is. I've never had a problem, I do all our assembly. My husband is not a guy that does instructions without major whining, where as I find it kind of empowering/relaxing/rewarding. I'm a visual and I've always found it easy (except for the IKEA entertainment center which nearly broke my will to live.) I've always found IKEA's instructions pretty clear despite having no words, but then I won a major design award for user manual design ten years ago so I might have a leg up on others.
Anyway we take the desk home and as we unpacked it I deemed it a about a one-hour project*. Didn't look that complicated. The instructions were okay, but not as visually detailed as IKEA's, but okay. The lack of details made assembly a few areas confusing. They had text. Which after two pages I completely ignored for being completely useless and overly technical. It didn't make anything clearer. It was nearly gibberish.
The biggest difference I noticed were the parts. Sure, it had an obligatory allen wrench**, and I'll give it to them the attaractive packaging for the hardware as it was nice for easy picking being packed like a children's toy on a card backed plastic shelled pod and all, but it was also hard to get into.
I dunno what they are called, but if you've assembled IKEA you will know what I'm talking about, the round flat nuts that are pressed into the precut holes on the boards and then turned to lock with a screw driver onto a headed shaft bolt… yea those, anyway when the Swedes do they have a nice arrow pointing to the direction of your incoming screw/bolt. It's easy, it's simple and pretty self explainitory.
Well Target's had no such arrow, so you have a 75% chance of getting the direction wrong right up front. Took us 20 minutes of cussing to go "oh maybe we should turn the nut". The thread direction wasn't really clear. Other things didn't seem drilled as nice, or the like. Over all I give it a C. The hour long project I guesstimated ended up being 2.5 hours.
But it really brought it home that IKEA knows what it's doing with this stuff, they aren't just guessing or cheaping out. There is actual method to the madness. And their drawings are much better than they are given credit for.
*My big tips for self-assembly: Spare your spine! Back the car to the door and unpack it on the porch then carry the pieces inside one by one, organizing them as you place them in your work area. Throw the packing trash in the can outside as you go. If you want you can just bring in the big outer carboard for a working surface if your floor is less than optimal or exceedingly precious. Oh, And use a shallow pan for dumping your baggies of hardware in, more room for fumbling for the right piece.
**I know I've never mentioned it but I think that fact that our IKEA being on ALLEN Road is freaking hilarious.
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Anyone who has assembled IKEA furniture knows that self-assembly does not need to be difficult. My spousal unit and I recently put together an IKEA dresser in about an hour and a half, and I’ve put together other IKEA products. Without fail, the directions are clear and concise (not translated from Korean into Hindustani and then to English!) and all the parts are there, with spares.
Target, Sauder and other manufacturers have a lot to learn from IKEA, and as IKEA gradually works its way into middle America they will learn who their Daddy is.
My husband and I furnished 4 rooms, from furniture to textiles and including the lighting(we came together with nothing), for less than $5k back in 2004. Everyone always compliments how nice our home looks and that they cannot believe everything is from IKEA. We saved at least $8k dollars. If time is money, I know we didn’t spend 300 plus hours assmebling all this great stuff just to make it worth the savings, NO WAY!! We calculated it all and we had 23 pieces to assemble and spent less than 50 hours total. Gimme a break people, the best things in life aren’t always free:) IKEA makes it so they nearly are.
Jen, you are SOOO right, the directions ARE easy even for dummies (proudly raising my own hand).
Those little circle things with arrows that go in the holes are called cam locks or cams. We have an IKEA kitchen, office, various bookshelves, and entire PAX wardrobe, and on and on. Literally, almost our entire house is IKEA or IKEA-hacked stuff. My 2 1/2 year old son calls the cams “wheels” and it’s his job to put them in with the arrows pointing toward the hole. (BTW - for other manufacturers that don’t have the arrows, just look in the end hole when you put them in and you can see how they are supposed to be lined up). My 2 kids literally helped us assemble our entire kitchen and Pax system - it was like a little assembly line. My 5 year old daughter LOVES the instructions since there are no words - she reads them to us and gets the pieces ready for the next step.
Honestly the only problem we’ve had with assembling the IKEA stuff is faucets - you have to get a bit creative with the non-standard supply lines.
We are seriously considering opening up a buisiness and becoming official “Assemblers/installers” once IKEA opens. We are both teachers and have a lot of free time in the summer, so what the heck?
I put most of all my IKEA kitchen cabinets together myself. I rather do it myself then pay somebody $50 an hour. I am cheap, and will save money anyway I can. Thank god for IKEA. We are “blessed” that we have one coming to OHIO finally!!!!! :ikealogo: