Why psychologists say you always end up arguing in Ikea anyway

“You can also park here,” I start cheerfully, in a nice tone. But stubbornly he drives on without looking, because he thinks he can find a better spot. Yay, the fun begins.

When we park the car, there's always bickering. “You’re not going to throw every candy jar and tea towel into that cart, you know. We don’t need that. And no eighteen picture frames for the wall that we’ll never hang up.” We walk towards the yellow Ikea letters and the irritations hang around us like little rain clouds. “We do need a new rug for the couch, really,” I say. “We already have seven rugs.” “But eight looks so nice.” We just got inside.

According to psychologists, it’s not so strange that we argue in Ikea. This is mainly due to the fact that there is a billion choices in Ikea. In everything. For example, there are already 80 different sofas and 54 different pans. Not to mention the bedding, cabinets, and vases section. Precisely because there is so much of everything, it’s hard to choose and thus the chance increases that you don’t agree. Once you disagree on one little thing, the floodgates open. It only gets harder to agree on something else. And you also want to take into account the person you love, but how does he come up with choosing that square blue corner sofa instead of that beige, soft, cozy three-seater? How?

There’s more. Experts say it also brings up other old pains, that whole fuss about whether or not to have glasses with a golden rim. Because it evokes different memories for everyone. As in: “I can’t have those glasses with the golden rim because you decide everything in the kitchen every day. In the house. Everything is yours and how you want it. You’re so bossy.” That idea. Or the other way around: “Why do you want those glasses with a gold rim? You never get a glass of water for me.” In short: there’s more to it. Those glasses suddenly aren’t just ordinary glasses anymore. And then the gemütliche atmosphere quickly disappears and small wooden pencils are soon thrown around. Moreover, we also project a lot onto our partner in a store when something doesn’t work out. Is that nice table sold out? Well %^&$^@!$#. Your fault.

No, my funniest anecdote regarding Ikea comes from the time when it was over between me and my boyfriend (read: it had something to do with a blinking light for years). My boyfriend is named Billy. And one day my mother took me and my broken heart for a nice mother-daughter outing, to cheer me up a bit, she thought. We went to Ikea. I could choose something, nice. Sweet. But no. You guessed it: I suddenly found myself in an aisle, no, in a whole hall, a whole floor, full of Billy cabinets. Thousands. Tears streaming down.

Oh, luckily it turned out well with the human variant of Billy. Who knows, maybe one day I can even buy the ninth rug for our couch. I hold on to hope.

FACTS

• The Billy bookcase is the best-selling product of Ikea. Worldwide, a Billy is ordered every ten seconds.
• All the books you see in the showrooms at Ikea are from the employees themselves.
• Why all Ikea products have names? The son of founder Ingvar Kamprad is dyslexic, and his father thought this way he could remember everything better.