Ikea To Go

June 16, 2009 12:38 PM

I am planning a road trip to Ikea (Denver -> Draper, UT). Some friends are saying I should fly to Salt Lake then rent a truck to haul the stuff back. Some friends are saying I should drive out using my SUV. Help me make the right decision.

I recently purchased a home and am finding much of the local furniture options either very low quality and hopelessly ugly. I've decided that I must have some pieces from Ikea that are simply not available in the Denver metro area.

Shipping is out of the question. A TV console costing $400 ships for $350 dollars!

The 8 hour drive from Denver is doable. I own an SUV and can easily drive over there, get what I want and drive back. Some friends are suggesting I do a one-way flight ($49/Southwest) and rent a truck/van/something big to bring the stuff back. I've looked into this and most of the car rental companies at SLC seem unmotivated to do a 2-3 day rental one way for < $300. This seems unreasonable to me.

I need to execute this whole thing in 3 days or less.

Here are some things I need to buy:

1) A TV console
2) Living room storage (in the form of kitchen wall cabinets, Billy book shelves or other standing shelving units).
3) A desk (I -really- want the Gallant desk but it is a lower priority)
4) Miscellaneous nick nacks and other cool stuff that I won't be able to pass up.
5) I'm still 'shopping' in my mind. I plan to have everything mostly figured out before I get there so I can just buy everything and turn around and come back.

Questions:

1) If you were me, how would you do this? Ship, flight, drive?
2) Any tips from fellow Ikea-shoppers out there?
3) Will I be devistated when I get there to find out that they don't really have Billy bookcases ready to go? Anything unusual like that?
4) Any recommendations (for things to buy) from other Ikea lovers?
5) Out of the box ideas?

posted by shew to home & garden (21 comments total)

If there are specific pieces you know you want (which it sounds like you do), you may want to call ahead to make sure they're actually in stock. This is especially the case if you want add-ons (such as extra shelves, glass cabinet doors instead of wood, etc.) -- some Ikeas stock them, and some don't, as I found out awhile ago when I went to the Burbank Ikea and wanted to buy a Billy bookcase along with extra shelves. Except it turns out that Burbank Ikea doesn't carry the extra shelves, but the Carson Ikea (30 miles away) does. That was a fun afternoon.
posted by scody at 12:51 PM on June 16

I don't have answers for all of your questions, but I do know you can do an inventory search to see if what you want is in stock. I did this because my local Ikea (Emeryville) was out of a these red side tables I wanted, and I didn't feel like driving to Palo Alto unless I could be sure I could buy them. (there may be a disclaimer that this isn't guaranteed, though)

I have three of the Billy bookcases, and while they are pretty cheap quality, I like the look and price and found them really useful to line the walls of my office with.

Some of their dressers and desks are nice looking and seem pretty sturdy. They usually have all of these put together so you can check out the finished product.

The other thing they have that I love are many many shapes, styles, and sizes of frames, plus tons of prints to go with them for decorating walls.

If I were you I would drive to avoid hassles with flight and rental truck. Oh, and the Idea website also has the measurements of their products in the boxes so you can make sure it will fit.
posted by JenMarie at 12:51 PM on June 16

Have you looked into UHaul or the like? They're much more amenable to one-way rentals, and they're probably cheaper than going with a traditional car rental company. Otherwise, I would be pretty surprised if you couldn't fit everything in/on your SUV. I have a compact car and I've never have a problem getting things home from Ikea (large desk, dresser, coffee table).

Ikea usually can provide twine and these "roof protector" thingies if you need to strap stuff to the top of the car. The protectors are pieces of corrugated cardboard that have a triangular cross-section, about 3-4 long (think extra-large Toblerone bar).

Plan for at least 1-2 hours to go through the showroom if you're looking for "cool stuff". Plus, each piece of furniture in the showroom is tagged with the corresponding location in the warehouse - makes it much easier to find things when you're ready to finally pull stuff off the shelves.

Are you bringing help? Flat-pack is great, but because they usually try to cram an entire piece of furniture in a single box, they can easily exceed "two-man" lift - the dresser I bought was 100 pounds and I had to move it by myself. Don't wreck your back for some cheap furniture.
posted by backseatpilot at 12:54 PM on June 16

Maybe this isn't appealing to you, since you've just bought your home, but I would strongly recommend checking on your local (or nearby) Craigslist before you make such an expensive trip. I have bought like-new Ikea stuff for a fraction of the price, and believe me when I say Ikea furniture is plentiful on Craigslist.

Just a thought!
posted by Pomo at 1:00 PM on June 16

Just me, but most of Ikea's stuff would be assembled by you at your home. We're talking many long boxes, so it seems your SUV would handle it. I carried a whole Ikea bedroom set in my Honda Civic trunk, with my back seats folded down. Seems like a simpler process than procuring a flight, a rental, and a rental return in 3 days. good luck.
posted by heather-b at 1:04 PM on June 16

I'd suggest renting a truck. I took our SUV (a Hummer H2) to Ikea over the weekend (only a 3 hour drive for us). I wanted some Billy bookcases.

To fit them in the car, they had to be wedged between the front seats (driver and passenger) and ran the entire length of the vehicle. Much of Ikea's furniture, including the Billys that I bought, runs 72 to 84 inches in length when in the packaging (the length of the longest single piece of the item). I think even in an SUV you'd be pushing it. The ride back home with 3 tall Billys poking into my arm was...unpleasant.

I agree with what is said above about a UHaul that perhaps you can hitch to your SUV. Or maybe renting a cargo van for the round trip might be cheaper than the one-way rental.
posted by arniec at 1:06 PM on June 16

Most of the above are great ideas. I'd summarize and second as:

(1) Check whether the IMPORTANT things are in stock before you go. (2) Fly there and rent a U-Haul truck back, that's cheap and they don't mind one-way rentals. (3) Take two hours for the showroom and another for hunting the warehouse part. And I'd add (4) measure your spaces before you leave -- all possible spaces -- so you're mentally equipped to make changes on the fly or fill new needs once you see new things, which relates to (5) don't be afraid to change your mind once you see things in person: some of my favorite Ikea items weren't even in the catalog.

(Also, the idea of a Hummer in the Ikea parking lot is strangely amusing to me.)
posted by rokusan at 1:16 PM on June 16

What Pomo is suggesting.
posted by General Malaise at 1:20 PM on June 16

-Check stock before you go, preferably with a real person.
-Fly.
-Rent a one-way U-Haul.
posted by Night_owl at 1:25 PM on June 16 [1 favorite]

You should buy a utility trailer. Both Red Trailer and Northern tool have 4X8 trailers for less than $500 and Northern offers free shipping if neither have dealers in your area. For half of what it'll cost you for a rental you'll never have to figure this again. And a trailer is so much better for hauling stuff like plywood, gyproc, dirt, trees, gravel, sod etc. than trying to stuff those things in inside your SUV (which usually have very poor bulky cargo capabilities). These little trailers can just hooked to a bumper ball so even if you don't have a receiver on your SUV you don't need to spend a lot to get hooked up.
posted by Mitheral at 1:26 PM on June 16

I made my first trip to Ikea last month. Just wanted to mention that although they do have the stock checker on the website, I wouldn't necessarily trust it. In my case they did have something in stock that the website said they didn't, but that says to me that it could go the other way too. If you are dead set on getting something in particular, you should call.

For your particular case: that's a long-ass drive. If you can actually get a flight for $49 I'd do that in a heartbeat. I mean, gas is going to cost you twice that much each way right? A small U-Haul-type (but not U-Haul, because apparently they suck) truck won't cost you more than $100 or so.
posted by Who_Am_I at 1:26 PM on June 16

Very likely, you will not fit everything you want in your SUV. Rent a vehicle or a trailer. Maybe you could tie stuff on top if you've got a rack.
posted by gnutron at 1:34 PM on June 16

Drive it. A 1-way trip in a uhaul is ridiculously expensive. A quick quote check on U-Haul.com resulted in a $374 charge for the basic 10' truck, and that doesn't include gas. Tack that on to your $49 airfare (don't forget taxes and fees- probably adds up to $75ish) plus cab fare from the airport to the uhaul place and you're already at $500-600 for just the transportation of your new furniture. And isn't the glory of Ikea the fact that it's affordable? With that kind of expense, you could just buy from a regular furniture store. Driving it in your SUV is definitely the better choice.
posted by JuiceBoxHero at 1:34 PM on June 16

There is an Ikea coming to Denver FYI, but it will probably be in the 18-24 month time range. You may want to keep that in mind though and get some essentials from there now knowing you can always fill things out later locally.
posted by Kimberly at 1:42 PM on June 16

If it's at all practical to do so, try to check your purchases for damage. We recently bought several large items from the Draper, UT Ikea and came home to find that individual boards and shelves were badly cracked/scratched in a few of our purchases. It would be a major bummer to drive home 500 miles and find out that your shelves are damaged.

If you're traveling without passengers, then you could most likely fit everything in an SUV without a problem. Have fun!
posted by lbo at 1:54 PM on June 16 [1 favorite]

Also, if this is a place where there isn't much affordable furniture, maybe post some ads on craigslist to see if you can't find someone who would like to split the ride with you? That way the rental truck doesn't cost as much.

Alternatively, if you decide *exactly* what you want, post ads on the Denver craigslist and pay someone who is headed your way anyway to go to Ikea, buy what you need, and bring it to you. I live near an Ikea (SoCal, sorry), and if I was headed on a road trip towards your town, I would personally find it very entertaining to buy a bunch of furniture for someone else and deliver it to their new home.

Could be just me, though.
posted by arnicae at 1:54 PM on June 16

Oops, should have said the Salt Lake City craigslist...or you could find ridesharers to make the drive more entertaining...

FYI, this dude wants to go to Denver sometime next week, as does this guy

This guy is driving with his hound from SLC to Denver
posted by arnicae at 2:00 PM on June 16

Just wanted to second what arniec said about the size of some Ikea stuff vs. SUV's. If you're getting the full height Billy bookcases, the box it comes in really is that tall. A friend and I hadn't planned on that when we drove out to one here to get a Billy for me, and we had a pretty awkward ride home with the bookcase package barely wedged inside the SUV as we had no way of roping it to the roof.

Their website does give "package measurements and weight" so you can find out how big and heavy things will be even flat-packed.
posted by dnash at 2:11 PM on June 16

Taking someone is a good idea just so that you'll have help! That stuff may be flat-packed, but it is often heavy and unwieldy!
posted by jgirl at 3:41 PM on June 16

What about overstock.com? Their furniture is often more expensive than Ikea, but it is usually much more durable, and shipping is only $2.95. Quick search for TV consoles shows they have nearly 50 for under $500.
posted by lesli212 at 4:19 AM on June 17

If you have a lot of stuff it might be difficult to push all of it around the store, especially if you have more than one cart. I was able to get some Ikea employees to help me load up the flat pack stuff and push the cart around. There were two other employees who helped me load stuff into my car. This might be a YMMV sort of thing though.

If you have not been to Ikea before you should be aware that it is a huge, huge store and it can take quite a while to travel through the whole thing. I recommend stopping at the Ikea restaurant first.

Do you really need to rent a car for 2 or 3 days? You should be able to get this done in 24 hours. If you want to spend a day or two on something else it might be cheaper to rent a small local car and only pay the expensive rate for returning elsewhere on the last day.

You can probably find someone in Denver who is either taking a vehicle and trailer to Idea or who would like to go with you and split the cost. If you are lucky someone may have extra space and be happy to pick some things up for you without you even needing to travel along.

If I were you I'd network around and find someone else who wants to go to Ikea, get them to arrange a trailer, and drive. If I get to stick with being me I'd wait for someone else I know to go to Ikea and send along my shopping list.

I have bought like-new Ikea stuff for a fraction of the price, and believe me when I say Ikea furniture is plentiful on Craigslist.

I'm sure it is if you live within 300 miles of an Ikea store.
posted by yohko at 9:25 AM on June 17