But where are the meatballs?

Credit: Zheka Kapusta / Unsplash

IKEA’s has entered the secondhand furniture space. It is called IKEA Preowned and is getting a trial run in Oslo and Madrid. At the end of the year, IKEA will assess how to move forward or expand the idea.

You add an item to your shopping cart and then agree with the seller on a meetup location where you can take possession. IKEA makes it easy from a seller’s perspective. They use AI to generate a description of the product along with its dimensions and also recommend a selling price, which eliminates many of the headaches of reselling.

How well do you think this will work?  On one hand, it seems like a great idea.  The secondhand furniture market is expanding and keeping stuff out of the landfill is a laudable mission. The brand may get some credit for its environmental bona fides.

On the other hand, navigating the maze of the store, eating the meatballs and lingonberry sauce, and assembling the furniture yourself is a huge part of what makes IKEA IKEA.

The furniture is fine – it’s not going last you for 100 years or be suitable for Buckingham Palace, but serves its purpose.  However, I am not sure whether people are buying IKEA furniture as much as they are the IKEA experience.  How much of that experience will get lost here and how much can be replicated or reinvented?