Sorry, this is a bit of a rant…
I had to assemble an IKEA flatpack cabinet today.
I always find this process painful because, to me, the instructions are always lacking (and a lot of other flatpack kits have followed IKEA’s trend of picture-only guides). How hard is it to put a name below each component on the parts page (so I know what this weird thing is when it appears on page 22!), or indicate what’s the top/front/back/etc.?
Today it would have been really helpful to know which edge was the top and front for the sides of this kit, rather than flipping back-and-forth through the manual to work it out. The irony is that they got so close to realising this was a factor, since the instructions did actually have two procedures (depending on whether your ceiling was high enough to stand the cabinet up after assembly or whether you needed to assemble it in-situ).
Is it just me and does everyone else just find it easy to follow the instructions, or do a lot of other people struggle with them too?
I just spent the week assembling furniture. IKEA’s instructions and overall build quality have fallen from the last time I did this. The instructions have gotten less detailed (as in, do I use the board that has six holes in pattern A or pattern B? The boards aren’t labeled and the patterns are very similar). Also, the hardware has gotten even cheaper than before. The cams that capture the hidden screw heads have always been fairly easy to strip if you’re not careful and they seem even moreso now. I didn’t have any trouble because I came into the task knowing this, but it was still a bit of a let down.
The store experience itself was about the same, with less employees milling around which is good for the showroom but bad for the warehouse. Overall the experience was slightly more negative than previously, especially since the prices have jumped for what IKEA offers which is, let’s face it, assemble it yourself junk furniture.