Daily Dose

I just realized that I never blogged about our visit(s) to IKEA Orlando. Oops, my bad. I got really distracted by Jenn’s visit, TW’s trip to Atlanta and my own hectic work week. So let me try and hit the highlights for you.

First, IKEA Orlando does not have Swedish pancakes or lingonberries for sale in its cafeteria – yet. They just have the boring scrambled eggs etc… and cinnamon rolls. HMPH. The cafeteria workers have indicated they will be selling them, they just didn’t know when. I guess maybe they have to be taught how to make Swedish pancakes or something? Though TW made them from an IKEA mix this morning and they tasted exactly like IKEA’s so it doesn’t seem to hard. Whatever. I was disappointed.

Also, going to IKEA Orlando on a Thursday, a week after Thanksgiving, was not as horrible as I was afraid it was going to be. It wasn’t very crowded at all.

IKEA Orlando is either sold out of a bunch of stuff I would like to have had or they never got a shipment of those items in the first place. Not sure which it is but it was slightly troubling. How can they have Billy bookcases in brown/black but not have the height extension units? Annoying!

IKEA Orlando has self-checkout stations – a ton of them and they work OK but not super great, particularly if you purchase something from the “return – as/is” room. IKEA Orlando could use 2 fewer self service lines and 2 more cashiers, particularly on weekends.

IKEA Orlando on the first Sunday in December was frightening…from the parking lot. When we pulled in, there were cars parked in the empty field in front of IKEA. Scared the hell out of me. But as I drove through the parking lot I realized there was a ton of side parking and it wasn’t nearly as bad as I thought. Still more crowded than our Thursday visit but not as bad as I’ve seen IKEA Atlanta on a Saturday.

IKEA Orlando felt smaller than IKEA Atlanta – is it? Or was it just my imagination?

IKEA Orlando changed a ton of “room” displays between the time I visited on a Thursday and the time I visited on Sunday – three days and a ton of rooms were completely different. I was really surprised. How often does IKEA change a room display in general???

IKEA Orlando’s returns & exchanges personnel were very fast and very friendly – BOTH times I had to visit them. On Sunday, there were 11 people ahead of me in line and I was afraid it was going to take hours. Instead, it took about 10 minutes. Amazing.

Overall impressions… pretty darn good and I’m not just saying that because I like the idea of a two hour drive better than a five hour drive.