not to mention the collection of allen wrenches you'll collect as you get more and more furniture. LOL
- Thread starter J D Sauser
- Start date
IKEA selling out?
not to mention the collection of allen wrenches you'll collect as you get more and more furniture. LOL
IKEA everywhere has a big, well publicized, sale once or twice a year... (used to be once a year... think it's twice now). I don't see how that translates into, or sounds like "everything must go". As for the random comment from an (unnamed) store employee that "they were going to close the store"... not exactly an unimpeachable source, and definitely not something I'd bet on. Common sense dispels this rumor with the fact that IKEA is opening a new branch facility in Bavaro, (as mentioned in a couple of other threads.)
I know a lot of Dominicans from Santo Domingo that own apartments in Marbella Juan Dolio and some of them have their places furnished from IKEA. so I do not see the reason as of why would they close
Let me make something clear. While I questioned the applicability of the Ikea format to the local idiosyncrasy when the word came up that Ikea would come to the DR. I would NOT take ANY pleasure to see Ikea fail here (the "wishful thinking comment" in one post).
I have enjoyed "escaping" into the store every once in a while and picking up "this'n'that". Like many expatriates I like to think that I am pretty handy with a screw driver or a little allen wrench.
I would also be one to think that a company like Ikea, which has succesfully run operations in many very different countries with their very rigid business format, would have invested a fair amount of money to investigate if their concept would stand chances and find adepts in a new environment before dumping a multi Million investment.
Would they really leave, as it was RUMORED, it would be a big loss to the DR as a place seeking foreign investment, because it could put the government's ability to protect foreign investment into quite a bad light.
These are my thoughts and concerns.
It was a QUESTION with some thought, Gentlemen. I WOULD appreciate the "inside scoop" even if it came with a baby face attached to it.
... J-D.
I have enjoyed "escaping" into the store every once in a while and picking up "this'n'that". Like many expatriates I like to think that I am pretty handy with a screw driver or a little allen wrench.
I would also be one to think that a company like Ikea, which has succesfully run operations in many very different countries with their very rigid business format, would have invested a fair amount of money to investigate if their concept would stand chances and find adepts in a new environment before dumping a multi Million investment.
Would they really leave, as it was RUMORED, it would be a big loss to the DR as a place seeking foreign investment, because it could put the government's ability to protect foreign investment into quite a bad light.
These are my thoughts and concerns.
It was a QUESTION with some thought, Gentlemen. I WOULD appreciate the "inside scoop" even if it came with a baby face attached to it.
... J-D.
Fair enough, you heard what you heard. I don't believe it, but that might be wishful thinking as well....just as you say I like to escape now and then and feel in my homeland. The very first time I went I got so immersed that when I get on the escalator stairs back to the parking, look out the window and see the mess on Kennedy avenue, I really thought: oh noo! I'm still here
No....from Holland, although Ikea legally ?s a dutch company, I was not referring to that, but to the fact that I would visit Ikea back in Holland every now and then and that the experience is almost 100% the same.
You can "peg" this one to the Doom and Gloom practitioners on the Debate thread of the DR economy, where they have been predicting an end to the economy of the DR as we know it, since... I think January 2008...
I can't count the times they have predicted Malls to shut down due to lack of clients, only to still see them the same or reinvented with a new anchor. They don't seem to learn their lessons as the first and oldest "Mall/Plaza" shopping center of the DR is still in biz and yet still on their yearly predictions to "shut down" list...
There are colmados with a longer history since first they opened in the DR than most biz where you came from in comparison...
Most expats are still clueless to how the DR economy works, let alone how biz can be profitable on their eyes and mind here...
Until they don't pull out their preconceived notions from the gutter and the drug based notions of an economy a la Colombia, they will never get it!
I tried many at times to teach the basics to a many here, but with little success due to lack of a real attitude to learn from the naysayers...
Just like Robert (Cobraboy) learned to open up a biz from his home office in Jarabacoa, many Dominicans start from home alone and build up from there. The home/relations biz by recommendation is never left behind, even when they open formal stores/offices in Malls or commercial locations.
IKEA is a zillion money making multinational, with plenty of know-how to invest. Ask yourself this question in all seriousness:
Why out of all the possible and for all the preconceived notions, did IKEA opted to open their first store in all of Latin America and region outside of the US and Canada in the DR?
Do you really think that just because L. Fernandez said to them some years back to come and enticed the plate with tax and other perks in favors, would make that giant just invest millions in a store here? Do you think that they cared little for how and where could the profit from their investment here and for how long?
Do you think that having outpaced in clients a long established department store like Americana next door is an easy feast to accomplish?
Do you think that having not one, but two large scale shopping malls with nothing of comparable size in all of the DR save for the other new one some blocks away in Sambil, getting ready to open across the street and next door is a bad thing for them?
Do you really think for a second that La Sirena and other chains are expanding like weed in the DR because they are losing money or just breaking even at the tills?
Bellon and Ochoa are just starting to expand rightfully in the home market, with stores that could easy rival any large Home Depot or Lowes in the largest markets.
What people must understand is that you can't expand or invest more money into a flat or losing biz model. They are expanding and investing due to a reason!
IKEA is expanding their coverage little by little in the country, learning what works and what doesn't on the way to there.
In a few years you'll see not only the SD store, but tow new ones in Santiago and Punta Cana for good, with more delivery points in the pipes down the line well into Haiti too(didn't see that one coming eh!).
But apart from that I think IKEA must be doing quite well and I think it is great they are here and the news about Bavaro shows their progress. I would not be surprised if they open an IKEA like in the capital there if the population in the area grows as expected.
Nothing against Ikea in itself and I can vouch for their laminated furniture not separating in the humid, salty coastal climate after a couple of years...... but....
I couldn't imagine handing that furniture down the family line.
It just gets thrown out.... disposable society and all that.
With all the caoba around it seems a bit cac to shop in Ikea for furniture.
Purely down to taste though..... it is soooo 1998.
But it is a fkn rip off compareed to Ikea in Europe.
I couldn't imagine handing that furniture down the family line.
It just gets thrown out.... disposable society and all that.
With all the caoba around it seems a bit cac to shop in Ikea for furniture.
Purely down to taste though..... it is soooo 1998.
But it is a fkn rip off compareed to Ikea in Europe.
I used to work in a warehouse when i was young and beautiful, my job was to assemble these furnitures for clients. I still have nightmares after so many years.
So dont come here with your romantic view on these type of lego furnitures. "#?"#?
So dont come here with your romantic view on these type of lego furnitures. "#?"#?
And it was me who bought the lot next to it, just so I can move there, as you may have heard too.
I could lease you a parking spot (with WiFi!)?
... J-D.
Most of my friends are starting to get married, and most of them are going to IKEA for furniture and decor, it's affordable without looking cheap. I can't imagine going to Ilumel to buy anything :S I won't be passing down IKEA furniture to my kids that's for sure. But with the prices if I get bored of the same furniture after a couple of years, I can just buy another one.
PICHARDO informs
Bellon and Ochoa are just starting to expand rightfully in the home market, with stores that could easy rival any large Home Depot or Lowes in the largest markets.
be careful how you throw those imaginings around. the operating revenues for Home Depot are larger than the DR GDP. extrapolate from there.
Bellon and Ochoa are just starting to expand rightfully in the home market, with stores that could easy rival any large Home Depot or Lowes in the largest markets.
be careful how you throw those imaginings around. the operating revenues for Home Depot are larger than the DR GDP. extrapolate from there.
I am an IKEA lover too. I did NOT want my mother's furniture and I suspect my kids won't want mine, so it does the job for me
Time have changed, I grew up with the same TV in my house, my toddlers are about to see their second one :bored:
I have to admit I like some of it it too.. I just feel that buying Ikea furniture is like voluntarily being part of the matrix....
Silly, I know....
Silly, I know....