Austinist Wanders Around the New IKEA Round Rock

you honestly think IKEA employees would go on websites to defend their company? have you... ever actually had a job? They don't care.

I know everyone complaining about IKEA buys from the big suppliers they bitch about. (oh well it's the only place i can go to....)

grow up. gain some perspective.

Oops - email addresses don't automatically show up.

amaguir2@uiuc.edu

I came upon this article while searching for information on IKEA's practices in the way of human rights and environmental progress. Basically what I've found is that IKEA has a great environmental record (at least compared to other mainstream retailers) and that they treat the people who work directly for them pretty well.

However, I have been unable to find any information - positive or negative - on IKEA's labor practices regarding the workers in the factories they source from. Unless you count that stuff that Kevin took from the IKEA website, which I definitely do not. No corporation, no matter how seemingly responsible, can be trusted to monitor itself.

I'm not sure it's entirely fair to automatically equate IKEA with Wal-Mart, though. It's worth noting that Wal-Mart sells all kinds of products made by all kinds of brands that source from all kinds of factories, most of which are probably sweatshops. IKEA, on the other hand, is its own brand that sources directly from factories, which in theory should make it easier to monitor labor practices. Whether or not they actually do that remains to be seen.

If anybody finds any information on this subject, could you e-mail me?

I'm just excited about the inclusion of "Swede" as a new race. Can someone tell me which box I need to check to earn some affirmative action?

You've got to love the grammar nazis on message boards. Are you guys serious? Do you really put your comments into a word processor and have them spell checked? This is laughable. Please find something to do with your life; or maybe it's that you need to get one first?

nope, nothing racist.

And why is the every justification of IKEA's good citizenship just a link to the IKEA website. Every corporation says the same thing, and just having clever slogans proves nothing at all.

The facts are that most of IKEA's "profits" are untaxable because they go to a "charitable foundation" dedicated to furthering interior design and art in the modern home" or some "merde" like that. All well and good, except this charity is the 2nd largest in the world (only after Warren Buffet gave his money to the Gates Foundation) and the execs and owners make out like bandits.

And why are there people so passionate about defending the company, it's like rooting for the Yankees? My guess is that there are a few IKEA employees trollin' the interweb lookin' to destroy bad press...any thoughts?

so i think it is funny that round rock/ williamson county gets the yuppie modern design ikea store and buda/ hays county gets the red neck huntin' and fishin' and killin' thangs cabellas store. i didn't realize the population in central texas was so segregated.

;)

Apparently, the readers of the Austinist do not know about this thing called Google, in addition to not knowing to write out their comments in standard word processor software and running a spell/grammar check, then copy and paste their words into the comment form.

I am half-Swedish, and the bigoted ignorant, dare I say RACIST comments preceding this are enough to make me go medieval on some buttocks.

If you took 15 seconds to type in "Ikea corporate policy" into the Google search box you will get Results 1 - 10 of about 863,000 for Ikea corporate policy. (0.13 seconds) and this as the first hit

http://www.ikea-group.ikea.com/corporate/privacy_policy.html where if you click on “Our Responsibilities” you will see this:

"low price but not at any price"



"For more than 60 years IKEA has been working on ways of creating low prices – purchasing as inexpensively as possible, building our own stores, flat-packing furniture for customers to put together themselves.

But our ambition doesn´t stop there. We also want the products we sell to be free from hazardous substances. And we don´t want the wood in bookcases, tables or other products in the store to come from areas where forests are being devastated.

All IKEA suppliers must follow certain fundamental rules.

Working conditions must be acceptable, child labour is not tolerated and suppliers must adopt a responsible attitude to the environment."

and a lot more. Did all the Austinist readers buy their term papers to graduate from college, or only the regular commentators? (Austingal I am NOT including you. Congratulations on writing at a 12th Grade level.) Seriously folks, Research the topic before you let loose a bunch of HUIT, DRECK, and MERDE!

Anon:

That's what the people who clean your office each night make. No benefits, no vacation time, no sick time, no job security, etc. That's the hard facts.

Who in their right mind would work at a job for 50 hours and allow themselves to get paid only $300!?!??! Besides high school kids during the summer that is....

I think I'd try to generate some ambition if I was stuck in that position.

Two comments to add to the mix:

IKEA & Starbucks offer benefits to employees who work over 20 hours per week.

I work a regular 8-5 professional job and my friend at Starbucks pays the same $ per month and has the exact same medical benefits -- and he works part time.

That, in my book is worth a lot when there are 46 million americans without health insurance - most of who are working for Corporations that don't provide benefits or provide benefits that are too expensive for someone who works 50 hours and takes home $270.00.

I'm still not sure what's causing all the cool kids to get their panties in a bunch. Don't you know that having an IKEA in around town will make it that much easier for them to stand out as the unique individuals that they are?

And Anonymous if you want to hate on an -Ist for covering the broader region, you may want to see about franchising.

Wow, I just watched video of the opening. Is that not the saddest group of losers you've ever seen? (Besides those who camped out for a couple of days that is)

Also, Ikea is not in Austin, stop saying it is.

Ikea tries to source a lot of their building materials from around the areas where they have stores. They'll also hire anybody willing to work for $8 an hour (if you don't believe me, go to the Houston store--) and they exist for one reason-- to sell decent shit cheap enugh so "the masses" can afford decent knock-offs of the stuff the upper middle class owns. Win-win-win, right?

Whatev.

bunch of whiny hippies who'd rather complain than do anything constructive to make change. way to go, jargoffs. i assume you make all of your own home products and furniture by hand.

Regardless of their human rights record, IKEA coming to Austin, and the buzz generated *for* and by it, are yet another sign of the homogenization and consumerization of Austin and American culture in general. Like it or not, IKEA is effectively Walmart for yuppies. Austin is sucking at the great teat of corporate driven consumerism (which no doubt tastes like a Starbucks Grande Caffe Americano) as it fades into the American cultural background. People have recovered from the bubble with enough disposable income to consume and lust to have the exact same crap as everyone else. At least now, you can masturbate in the bathroom of the IKEA itself rather than being forced to just look at the catalog.

Having yet to go to an IKEA, I was planning to stay out of this conversation. However, I would point out that IKEA is more committed to helping the environment than other corporate giants I know of.

Go here:

http://www.ikea.com/ms/en_US/about_ikea/splash.html

And see the section on the bottom left, "social and environmental responsibility".

OK I have to chime in and agree with "please" here. This whole big box issue is complex, if you ask me. On the one hand, it's not very environmentally friendly to plop down that much concrete. Plus, stores that big and cheap are notorious for providing products that are handmade by 6 year olds in third world countries that make 4 cents a month or whatever.

HOWEVER, these huge companies are also the ones who are in a position to make a real global change if they are so inclined. Bob's Corner Lamp Store probably couldn't pull off what The Gap is doing right now, for instance. For one, they're doing that whole Red thing which is pretty badass. For two, they have something like 40 factories in Cambodia where there has been a pilot program to provide excellent working conditions. One might argue that their presence there is keeping the economy afloat.

I'm not saying all the big stores are full of tree hugging human rights activists by any means. And I have no idea what IKEA's corporate stance is on anything, really. What I *am* saying is that I'd be willing to bet that a lot of the people commenting here don't know either. As "please" suggested above, I think it's really important to resist the temptation to make vast sweeping statements. It's like racial profiling.

remember angsty kids, if it comes out of a store shaped like a large box its bad. if it comes from a run down shop in a strip mall whos employees make just over minimum wage with no health coverage, its good.

logic and facts be damned.

Grape,

I was asking a serious question. Is there any actual benefit for buying your light from one of the aforementioned stores vs IKEA? Are they made in a more happy place situation with union labor or something?

Other than not wanting a big parking lot and another big fucking box store, I'm not sure that there's really a local option to a light fixture.

I suppose IKEA doesn't pay as well as the Light Bulb store on Burnet or maybe doesn't give back to the community? The place on 290 and South Congress that I mentioned before is just in an ugly strip mall type thing. It's not like if that store went out of business because of IKEA anyone would notice (unlike the Burnet shop with the cool sign, etc).

Is buying a couch from IKEA any better or worse than buying a couch from the "local" stores on Burnet? I haven't seen any local little shops selling a couch that a human being working a normal job could afford... unless you count the salvation army.

Congrats Austin, now your young professionals can furnish their first apartments with the same fashionable, and yet affordable, pieces that have already turned domiciles in NYC, DC, SF, and Boston into post-grad dorm rooms!

(Really though, why wouldn't you buy that frying pan for a dollar?)

Yeah, it is quite amusing seeing there are numerous other lighting stores in Austin that are local companies. As I have not been to the "Austin" outlet malls, I will not go to Ikea either. I can get the same stuff within 5 miles of the '04

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Thanks Declan! I'd forgotten about the light bulb store on Burnet. I've be meaning to replace a couple bathroom mirror lights for a while now.

All I want to know is that no matter how much I loathe WalMart, IKEA, BestBuy, etc for being box stores... what are the other options for buying a goddamned light?

There's some light store on Burnet (I would assume they sell lights and not just light bulbs) and another on South Congress (or 1st) and 290. I'm guessing their lights come from the same sweatshops as IKEAs, they just don't look quite as hip, my mother would want to furnish her place with one, and they cost 25% more.

What the fuck else is there? How can I buy a light fixture without screwing over poor children in Indonesia? Is there a "Keep Austin Well Lit" store that sells organic lights made only with union labor?

alls i know is that if you are camping out for 72 hours to possibly win a gift card for $250, you're a loser.

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/11/15/15IKEA.html

what cocktail party are you dropping that at? and where does ikea place the svedish meatballs when you do them like this?

crossposted at corporatepressreleases.com

"You buy furniture. You tell yourself, this is the last sofa I will ever need in my life. Buy the sofa, then for a couple years you're satisfied that no matter what goes wrong, at least you've got your sofa issue handled. Then the right set of dishes. Then the perfect bed. The drapes. The rug. Then you're trapped in your lovely nest, and the things you used to own, now they own you.

...

And I wasn't the only slave to my nesting instinct. The people I know who used to sit in the bathroom with pornography, now they sit in the bathroom with their IKEA furniture catalogue."

I hope the Austinist got a free trendy post-modern lamp for this puff piece. Ikea is Wal-Mart with 4 hours of winter daylight, the welfare state, and accounting practices that would make Ken Lay (RIP) drool with envy.