To be honest, IKEA is a Swedish company by brand only. The products are sourced from wherever it is cheapest to manufacture right now and the ownership structure is so complex, multinational and tax-avoidance schemy that probably only the head honcho Ingvar Kamprad (IK in IKEA) who until recently resided in Switzerland, knows where the profit ends up.
(edit: got Ingvar Kamprads name wrong first time around)
Weird- I visited an IKEA with four friends and it felt much like a theme park. There was a cafeteria and everything.
Granted, our 5th friend--whiskey--was there too.
For me it has always been impressive how streamlined an Ikea is towards maximising revenue. I'm one of these people who tends to analyse my surroundings constantly for possible optimizations - yet in Ikea I couldn't come up with even one improvement that would make it better for the company. This alone is actually rather refreshing for me, finally a place where I can switch off my brain and just indulge in a bit of consumption!
Hmm, they sell them at the one closest to me (in Japan) [Yes I'm a Swede)
Regarding the trusts... I think that at the time (1970) and heavily socialist influenced era, it was more or less the only option to secure a privately owned and growing company from the tax man. The taxes were absurd at the time and small privately owned companies were very vulnerably to death-by-tax, especially if the owner died unexpectedly.
When the trusts are set up and the ownership is moved, there is not that much you can do about that actually, and the trusts can control to some degree how much tax the corporations pay as the trusts can charge royalties and set rates to minimize the earnings in the corporations that are "IKEA". Kamprad is probably a board member of all the important trusts, but the trusts are limited by their charter though, so there are limits to the control. It's true that they can't just give money away, at least without a courts ruling.
But still. IKEA have done a lot for the Swedish economy, there is still plenty of production in Sweden (as in Poland, or any cheap place in the world), and a lot of designers and engineers are employed in Sweden.
(Seriously, I don't get why lingonberries don't get a wider, eh, distribution. It's brilliant in so many things. My favorite is just tossing lingonberry jam into cream-based sauces.)
There's an old but good show that discusses the subject of our self-image pretty accurately (dunno if there are any english subtitles available) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4-V8_r0y-o
In CA, I loved going to IKEA to stock up on some swedish foods they have. I was very sad when they stopped carrying the foam cars, now it's mostly IKEA-branded stuff...
http://www.cloetta.se/ahlgrensbilar
"... sold since 1953 and marketed as "the world's most sold car" (which is possibly technically correct, by number of cars)."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GWDqdnE2yk
"Det finns bara ett sätt att stoppa den - i munnen!"
* Company owned by Ikea and buyers are selected with a lottery system held at an Ikea location
Sadly, the Swedish food they sell has deteriorated last few years. I can no longer recommend people to buy it.
Highly recommend visiting, if you can, go during June (end) for midsummer. I was there Dec - March, it was damn cold.
Would have been interesting if the anons weren't so hostile; instead it was just aggravating as 4chan always is.
I wonder what their responses to that question would be if they weren't afraid of being identified (by their voice, information they provided on the call, etc.).
> WHO ANSWERS WHEN I CALL? Everyone who lives in Sweden is able to register as an ambassador.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/01/09...
Now imagine this guy answering a phone line as an ambassador for the country!
NSFW article about the tweet: http://www.infowars.com/im-the-immigrant-fking-your-daughter...
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones_%28radio_host%29
I've no idea if that article is factual or not but let's not uncritically link to infowars.net, eh?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones_(radio_host)#Religi...
Unfortunately what I've seen implies they talk in English. Not that there's anything wrong with that. But my son has been taking French language class in school and this provides the obvious extension to their idea of "talk to a random French-speaking person" or whatever other language someone wants to learn. Something like that probably already exists anyway. I suppose there would be the predictable issues with most foreign language learners being minors.
Don't travel to Sweden. Don't support the Swedish government in any way. They are cooperating in a large-scale effort to censor the types of things you can read about in the newspaper.
This topic makes clear that I need really good, and fast, moderation tools
I dont understand obsession about Sweden. It is expensive country in decline with high crime. There are better places in Europe.
