Why Does IKEA Need to Know How Often New Yorkers Do Work On the Toilet?

IKEA is definitely one brand that you will find in tons of homes around the world. But do they need to be all up in your business too? IKEA has released the results of its Life At Home study and basically they know everything about everyone everywhere on Earth. The company surveyed 1,000 people in cities including New York, Singapore, Berlin, Mumbai, Moscow and Stockholm. And they did a deep dive into the minutiae of the average person's morning routine. In eight cities, people use technology for 11 minutes each morning. Few from Berlin or Stockholm take time for self-reflection (25 percent). And only 57 percent of the people in Berlin have breakfast compared to 77 percent of the people in Singapore. More people in Mumbai than in any other city have sex in the morning (13 percent). That same city also has the most people who pray in the morning (53 percent). New Yorkers spend more time than any other city getting ready and work most on the toilet. Multitasking! And in London, most people wake up at 7am or later. Slackers. So why in the world does a furniture and meatball purveyor need to know all of this stuff about you? "Ikea’s vision is to create a better everyday life, and everyday life starts with the morning," IKEA's group research manager Mikael Ydholm told The Huffington Post. OK. But there is a point when getting to know your customers can be a little creepy. The vision of everyday life that IKEA sells is in home furnishings. So knowing that New Yorkers value time each morning to get pretty could be helpful for IKEA stores in the tri-state area. They should have enough selection and stock to supply all those busy bathrooms. But emails on the throne? TMI. It's admirable that IKEA wants to know as much as it can about its customers. But there comes a point where it's a) not relevant and b) seemingly a little intrusive. Many people shopping at IKEA want furniture that isn't going to cost an arm and a leg. They have friends who don't use coasters, so they don't want to spend a ton on a coffee table. Or have children who love grape jelly and don't want to be too heartbroken if it gets smeared on the couch. "We wanted to cover every kind of activity that people do in the morning. It was not that we decided to go for anything specific or intimate,” Ydholm also said. IKEA knows that people have sex in their beds all around the world. It doesn't really matter what time of day it's happening. Just sell customers a bed that can handle that kind of activity and it's all good.

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Why Does IKEA Need to Know How Often New Yorkers Do Work On the Toilet?

IKEA wants to get to know you better.

Tonya Garcia

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Tonya Garcia