PHOTO BY Deborah Cortelazzi
When I first went to one of those huge stores here, I was amazed. Compared to ones in my home country, they are 20 times bigger. You can spend all your day there, and don't even notice how time flies. Most of those stores have food courts there, so eating is not a problem. There are even kid playgrounds, so you can leave your kid there and spend your money :) My son decided to go with us though, as it is comfortable to lay down in those big shopping carts.
If you want to get good quality, not expensive furniture, there is a place for it. IKEA
Little bit of wikipedia here. IKEA is a Swedish-founded multinational group that designs and sells ready-to-assemble furniture, kitchen appliances and home accessories, among other useful goods and occasionally home services. It has been the world's largest furniture retailer since at least 2008.
There is another fun part with this store. The store has 2 areas. The first one is where all the products are showcased, and the second one is the warehouse. All the showcased products has a special code and a note where to find it in the warehouse. So the process is to write down all product codes and locations that you wanna buy, then go get them from the warehouse, by yourself :)
At first this was kind of weird experience, as in my home country you just tell what you want to the workers, and they handle the rest. But I saw that all people here are just grabbing stuff from warehouse. Just check location, aisle and bin, find the item, check the code and you are done, pretty simple process. The second time i came to IKEA i felt as an expert in finding stuff in warehouse :) I enjoyed the process so much that for a short time I wanted to even work there.
For the prices, they are really affordable. And quality is good. If you still don't want to grab items by yourself, you can pay an official fee, and they can get them for you. What to do with all the beds, sofas, tables, chairs, kitchen stuff. How to get it to home? No problem, pay another 35$ and you get a next day delivery. Super cheap in my opinion.
Another fun with IKEA, though it may be just personal, is the assembly process. You get instructions with all products, all you need is some patience. I personally assembled all my furniture, and I really enjoy doing this. Still, if it is too complicated for you, you can always pay them, and they will come and assemble it for you. But come on, it is really fun to do it by yourself. And in the end you feel good, cause you made it with your hands.
So with few visits to IKEA, I had done with all my furniture. Beds, chests, sofa, rugs, tables, chairs, kitchen stuff like flatware sets, mugs and cups etc.
The next step was electronics and food. There is wholesale store Costco, which covers lots of this. In order to buy products from their store, you need to purchase their card first, there are 2 membership plans, but both of them worth it. They sell almost everything, electronics are always cheaper than in other stores, food is alot cheaper too, because it is wholesale. We usually don't buy too much food from there, my wife prefers Trader Joe's or Wholefoods.
With just one visit to Costco, I got TV, vacuum cleaner, hair dryer, iron. I also got stuff like drinks, napkins, paper towels, snacks, fruits, vegetables for a month.