I am no longer welcome at my local IKEA because I kept asking about the fake windows
I have always liked IKEA. Not even because of the furniture, I just think it is relaxing to walk through the different rooms and imagine the kind of people who would live there. Sometimes I go without buying anything. I just like looking around.
After maybe my sixth or seventh visit I noticed that almost every display room had a window with daylight behind it, even though obviously most of the showroom is in the middle of the building. At first I assumed they were just light panels, but then I realized they didn’t all have the same weather. One living room looked like a bright summer afternoon while another looked overcast. Some bedrooms even had what looked like early morning light.
I asked one of the employees how they decided what weather each apartment gets. He laughed a little and said they are just printed backdrops with lights behind them. I accepted that explanation because it sounded reasonable, but it did not explain why the weather seemed to change between visits.
Over the next few months I started taking pictures of the windows every time I went. I organized them into folders based on department and color of the lighting. I also made notes about whether the room was supposed to appeal to young professionals, families or students because I wondered if there was some connection.
Eventually I noticed what I thought was a pattern. Home office displays almost always had dull weather, while bedrooms and children’s rooms had noticeably nicer conditions. I honestly found that a little manipulative because people make different decisions depending on the weather they think they are experiencing.
I politely showed one of the employees a spreadsheet I had printed out. He looked at it for maybe five seconds before asking why I had visited the store fourteen times in two months. I explained that good research takes consistency. He told me that wasn’t really what he meant.
A week later I emailed customer support asking whether the artificial weather was decided locally or if each store received instructions from Sweden. They forwarded my email to the store manager, who invited me into his office. He explained that there was no weather system and asked me to stop photographing the displays because customers had started asking questions after seeing me measure the brightness near the windows with my phone.
Unfortunately I had already mentioned my findings in a neighborhood Facebook group because I thought other people might have noticed the same thing. One woman replied that she always felt happier in the bedroom section but assumed it was because of the mattresses. Another man commented that I should seek professional help. The discussion got surprisingly heated.
Now whenever I go into that IKEA someone eventually recognizes me. Officially I can still go, but last month I heard an employee quietly tell another one, “that’s the weather guy.” I was literally just there to buy a bookshelf, so it’s not very pleasant.
I still think the lighting changes more often than they admit. I don’t really see why they would lie about something so small, but I also don’t see why the home office always seems to have bad weather.
