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According to IKEA, you're not merely choosing furnishings for your bedroom, oh no you're taking the first steps to spiritual enlightenment by wishing into life your own personal center for well-being. Here's a sobering thought, marketing firms study Cults and the near mindless devotion they cultivate in their followers (This is a Fact, look up The Persuaders an awesome PBS documentary about marketing). These marketing gurus took what they learned and applied it to the art of selling products. The almost slavish love we have for name brands like Nike, Toyota, is no random accident, but a carefully woven spell whispered into our psyches. How else would you explain Guidos paying hundreds of dollars for an Ed Hardy T-Shirt? To them it's not a T-Shirt, it's a facet of their existence, it's about embracing the Ed Hardy Culture. Christian Audigier brilliantly combined the artwork of tattoo Don Ed Hardy with his apparel brand and viola, an endless line of chumps willing to shell out hundreds of dollars on something that would look good as a tattoo but not as an article of clothing.
Enter the Cult of IKEA, and enter the Gospel of Ingvar Kamprad founder and CEO of the furniture company. You can tell IKEA has a Cult like following by all the poor souls following IKEA's twitter and facebook pages. I liken them to followers of Thulsa Doom marching to the Towers of the Snake on Conan the Barbarian. The tired old days of simply selling a product are long gone, to compete in today's market a company must represent a lifestyle or face extinction. More than that, a company must make an emotional connection with it's target audience to ensure a loyal following for the life of that company. Firms, such as Nike, Coca-Cola, Toyota, Saturn, and many others have all transcended the customer-company relation and elevated it to something else entirely. IKEA is almost shameless in this regard, as I strolled through the newly opened IKEA store here in Tampa I couldn't help but laugh at marketing tsunami they try to overwhelm their guests with. The architecture, the design, the lay out of IKEA is all for the purpose of conveying a message. That message is Better Living, it suggests a fusion of frugality and trendy aesthetics. That's why when IKEA opened, we are introduced to the life story of the store manager, the history of IKEA from it's humble beginnings in the icy fjords of Sweden to it's growth as a massive world wide entity. It's all terribly boring, and the only reason why they would bother reciting you this story is to convey some message.
If you take a look at IKEA's Catalog and peruse the visual candy displayed on page after page. Ask yourself what is the message being imparted to you? A world where, better living is defined as one's physical environment ushering a person into spiritual rapture. In a nutshell IKEA is telling you that by purchasing their products you're one step closer to Zen like harmony. I say Zen, because I don't feel like I'm in Sweden when I go inside IKEA. Instead I noticed how the company appropriated Eastern Imagery, the prominence of colorful circles, the simple rice paper like lantern globes. When I think of Swedes I think of Meatballs, Bikini Teams, Hot Blondes, Hot Blondes, Vikings, and Hockey, I don't think of Feng Shui, and Ba Gua circles. Nor has IKEA limited itself to appropriating eastern mysticism, it has also appropriated Christianity and the New Age movement. Take a look at their Candles section if you don't believe me.  The candles themselves invoke, the new age image, and the candle holders wouldn't at all look out of place at a Catholic Altar for instance. None of these are accidental, they are all carefully designed to invoke certain emotions. In fact it's a lot like courting a girl, you have to invoke her emotional side in order to convince her to go with you, usually by manipulating her imagination. IKEA then, is one smooth player.
You might like shopping at IKEA, I know I do  , but don't be like those mindless trolls searching for spiritual growth at a freaking furniture store. Don't fall for this nonsense. This is nothing but a scheme of some dorky marketing executive, trying to part you from your hard earned money. Trust me, next time you look at an IKEA catalog, or eat some meatballs at the IKEA restaurant breath in all the not so subtle messages they are trying to brainwash you with. A furniture store is not something to hang our hats on, this is something only a higher power can do. Try to shut out the persuaders who constantly try to draw us into their webs. There's a reason why I never fall for these marketing gimmicks, the first reason is that you can't bullshit a bullshitter, and I'm a Jedi Master Bullshitter, I'm much too cynical and I know that we are not defined by what we buy. It's an awesome feeling shopping at a store, being unaffected by their marketing strategies while being in on their little secret.
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| | Posted 10/1/2009 7:16 PM - 33 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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