Camping Out Weeks ... at Ikea?

Nov. 22, 2005 — -- Concert tickets and movie premieres have long prompted diehard fans to camp out for days. But furniture?

That's what happened when Swedish furniture giant Ikea opened its 26th U.S. store in Stoughton, Mass., this month. About 1,000 people had lined up outside when the doors opened, including many who had been waiting there for days. A local high school marching band entertained in the parking lot while a rock band performed nearby, and traffic was gridlocked for hours.

It's become a familiar scene. The massive furniture chain's openings have turned into can't-miss events for the company's customers. They show up days in advance - sometimes with their faces painted in Ikea's signature blue and yellow colors -- and stage games in the parking lots.

Tent cities sprouted up outside Ikea openings in Atlanta and suburban Chicago earlier this year, bringing media coverage and a notable amount of buzz. Ikea has stoked the fires by offering gift cards and free merchandise to the first customers in line.

Marketing experts say the frenzied scenes generate extra local interest for the store in the weeks leading up to the openings. And because the customers create most of the energy, the festivities require very little in the way of marketing expenses.

"There's so much pent-up demand for these stores that the openings have become huge events," said Michael Levy, a marketing professor at Babson College and editor of the Journal of Retailing. "It's really a public relations windfall."

Levy noted that Ikea has for years enjoyed strong brand loyalty from its customers. Ikea sells a broad range of furniture, often at prices lower than competitor products. Levy noted that customers who don't have Ikea stores near them have been known to drive hours just to get to the nearest Ikea.

"There's a certain cache to Ikea -- it's Swedish, and it's very hip furniture for a reasonable amount of money," Levy said. "The markets they're going into are fairly urban, and a lot of people in those markets are already customers, and they're trendsetters."

Flying Cross Country for Furniture

For the Stoughton opening, 18-year-old Mike Rice, a college student from Snellville, Ga., flew from Atlanta to Boston 13 days before the opening. With only a tent, a few clothes and his Xbox, he took a cab out to Stoughton and set up camp in the store parking lot. Ikea allowed him to run an extension cord out to the tent for electricity, and he waited for nearly two weeks.

Why? For the free stuff. Rice collected $5,000 worth of Ikea gift cards as a reward for being the first in line. And he wasn't alone. Shortly after arriving, he was joined by several other die-hards who camped for days. The first five people received gift cards ranging from $500 to $5,000, and the first 100 people after that received a free chair.

Rice and his fellow campers killed time playing Monopoly and racing up and down the parking lot aisles in the nights leading up to the opening.

"I met a lot of people out there that I'll probably stay friends with," Rice said. "Now I've got a lifelong story of being able to say I camped out for two weeks at Ikea."

And when the doors finally flew open, did he embark on a historic shopping spree? Not exactly.

"I looked around for about 30 minutes, got some breakfast, and then headed back to the airport. I had to fly out at 12:30," Rice said. "I didn't want to get caught up in the 30,000 people they were expecting on opening day."

Ikea, a private company, does not disclose sales numbers or customer traffic, but various estimates suggest they've seen more than 20,000 customers on the first day at recent openings.

Keeping It Among Friends

Rice wasn't the first customer to make such a trek. In fact, the idea was first suggested to him by Chris Jones, a friend from Atlanta who flew to Chicago and camped out two weeks before the opening of an Ikea in Bolingbrook, Ill. He collected $3,000 in gift cards for his trouble.

Jones got the idea from a friend who was fourth in line for the Atlanta opening just months earlier. From simple word of mouth, a viral marketing phenomenon was born.

"The word about these events spreads virally, and that's what gets people feeling like it's worth it to go out there and check it out," Levy said.

And the company has been very savvy about the placement of its new stores.

"The typical Ikea customer is someone who is educated and usually younger. In Stoughton, there are about 120,000 college students right nearby in Boston. That's perfect for them," Levy said.

Gifts for a Pregnant Camper

An Ikea spokesperson said the giveaway promotions started at the 1999 opening of an Ikea in Emeryville, Calif. Employees noticed a pregnant woman camping out with a group waiting in line and offered her a free crib and some stuffed animals as a gesture of thanks. In the years that followed, other stores followed suit and offered various types of free merchandise.

The first formal, organized promotion came at the November 2004 opening of an Ikea in Tempe, Ariz. The first customer walked away with $1,500 in gift cards. Local media picked up on the small group camped out in the Tempe parking lot, and residents began driving by just to get a look.

"They were waiting over Halloween for the Tempe store to open, and people were coming by and dropping off candy. The first guy in line was actually getting mail in line -- it was addressed to 'the first guy waiting in line at Ikea,'" said Ikea spokeswoman Diane Kokoska.

Since then, the openings have only gotten bigger. For Ikea, the crazy antics have helped draw attention to the new stores. But the customers, many of them younger and looking for adventure, see it as a life experience.

Jones, who camped at the Bolingbrook store, said he made some close friends among the group of 100 who camped in the parking lot, sharing the communal experience and an appreciation for inexpensive furniture

"For me, it was for the incentives, but also for the adventure of it," Jones said. "It was cool listening to some of the older people talk about doing the same kind of thing waiting in line for Rolling Stones tickets. That was funny, because I told them now we just go on eBay for tickets."