Trip to Ikea

We went to IKEA last week to hit their Kitchen Sale. Kel had previously drawn out what we needed on their online planner so as to get a head start. We grabbed a bite to eat and got to the IKEA in Vaughan at about 7:30pm. For those who aren't familiar with their process, we had to put our names down on their list and wait for their sales representative. So there we were, sitting at one of their computers with our plan loaded on screen with random Backstreet Boys playing in the background, fine-tuning the details of our cabinets. (Seriously, who looks at the kick board at the bottom?! It never even occurred to me that we can get different colors, but I guess the "option" is always a plus.) Anyhow, the IKEA lady finally approached us at about five after eight. We told her our plan was ready and we needed her to go over it and print out a purchase order for us. She confirmed that we wanted to buy it today and then proceed to say it was too late and we should order it from Montreal. You can imagine the look on our faces!

"What do you mean order from Montreal?! There's a warehouse downstairs!"

"Yes, but it's too late today. You don't want to rush this. You should get it from Montreal. We can place the order for you and it'll ship over in 2-3 weeks."

"Why Montreal?! We don't want to wait 2-3 weeks! It's 8 right now, don't you close at 9?!"

"Yes, but you really don't want to rush this. After we print it, you still have to go downstairs and get everything and go to the cashier and then go to the delivery department. Or you can come back tomorrow and we can do it then."

"What?! Come back here tomorrow and wait in line again?! We were just here waiting for 45 minutes!" (Of course that's an exaggeration, but close enough.)

At this point, she looks over to the girl with the clipboard to confirm that we've been here for that long. The girl nods, smart to not get involved, and walks off. I swear we were there arguing with her for like a good 5-10 minutes before she finally decides to look at our plan. After she confirms the drawings and answers our questions, she tells us there's an issue with the printer and the only way was to write things out manually (while looking at her watch). You can imagine the look on Kel's face by then. I swear he had smoke coming out of his ears. As miffed as I was, I had to pull him for a walk to look at the counter tops.

In the end, she did write out down the parts numbers from our plan to paper, and then enter it back into another computer to print the parts list and so forth. By the time she was done it was close to 9 and we just took the papers and left. I've got to say it was the worse experience at IKEA ever, and we are going to hit the IKEA at North York this week to see about buying those parts. If I find her name anywhere on those papers, I might just file an angry grievance to their customer department.

Below is a 3-D rendering of what our kitchen will look like alongside the existing picture just for perspective.