The Pain of IKEA

In theory, the concept of IKEA is such a good idea.

In practice, however, I believe most customers leave there many hours after they expected to, frustrated from the system, and not completely satisfied with what they are leaving with. They do that because the thought of going back is so horrible they walk away with what they can.

If you have never been to an IKEA superstore the set up is something like this. Wander through the display showrooms along a designated route through living areas, bedrooms, kitchens picking out pieces of furniture you like along the way. This is the whole top floor of the warehouse and is a massive maze of every product IKEA sell. Then go downstairs through the ‘marketplace’ where small items are collected, everything from saucepans to picture frames, lamps, cushions, storage, rugs, coat hangers, linen……….. Then you hit the warehouse where, if you have recorded all the details correctly upstairs, you should find the furniture you are after, mostly in flat packed boxes which you place on specially designed trolleys and go to the registers. Sound simple?

We spent our time choosing the pieces we were after in the display section. We were fitting out most of our apartment and diligently wrote down the locations where we would find the various products in the warehouse. We actually went through this section twice, the first time to get an idea and the second time to lock in our choices. Each piece was discussed (sometimes with zeal) and decided upon. There were very few staff to assist throughout this area and they weren’t exactly friendly, knowledgeable, or particularly helpful after you had queued to see them. 3 hours later we hit the marketplace and filled a trolley of goodies..

Then we made the warehouse. We had 12 items to collect and as we learned quite quickly, this was a game of pot luck. Navigating through the busy warehouse with an already laden trolley trying to find the correct aisle and location was a challenge in itself but 6 of our items were out of stock – even a couch that when they had given me the code upstairs was ‘available’ was probably already on someone’s trolley. How frustrating! We were ready to just walk away. By this point you can’t just choose a slightly different colour or model, you would have to go back into the upstairs maze to find the details you needed – at this point, that was not an option!

Another consideration - delivery from Ikea Brooklyn to Manhattan is $100. Could we pay for what we had, and order the others for them to be delivered together – No. Could we pay and you store what had taken us 5 hours to put on our trolleys until we came back for the others – No. Could we order online what was not in stock. Only limited pieces are available online. And any delivery ordered online is $2/pound, which could easily be $200+ for the pieces we had remaining.

I have to point out also, I don’t think we saw a friendly or helpful staff member. I mean it must really suck to work there because they were all miserable. The friendliest people were the delivery guys, but that is outsourced to another company. One poor customer we saw in the warehouse section had been collecting multiple trolleys of flat packs. Obviously shopping on his own, he went to collect something leaving 2 other full trolleys up against a display. When he returned they had been removed and all the stock was being put away! Knowing how long he must have been there already, I nearly cried for him…

As our day turned into night, we decided to take what we had as otherwise it would have been a total waste of a day. Our experience was extended further when the sofa we had to collect from another window after check out arrived and was the wrong one. It was 9.10pm. Can you swap it? No, you need to go (and queue) to the returns window and process an exchange. The returns window was suppose to close at 9. Before we exploded, they did allow us to process our exchange and we managed to get out of there - relationship in tact!

Would I go back? Well, I can’t quite believe it myself but the next weekend we did. As we thought about it during the week, we really wanted to get the pieces that we missed out on so we went back with a plan. This time we were wiser.

Lesson learned – go early, beat the crowds and access the stock they have brought down from the massive shelves overnight. Lucky we did, with 2 of the items, only 2 were available, ½ hour later and they could have been gone.

I’ve decided it’s a love/hate thing people have for IKEA - while people dread going there, they go because it’s cheap. I think the sheer number of people that pass through there everyday means that they don’t need to care about their customer service. Shame on them.

Author notes:

1. My rant is over, but it feels good to have shared it!
2. This relates to my experience at IKEA in Brooklyn, NY.
3. Prior to writing this blog I did write to customer service at IKEA to explain our displeasure – it would have been nice to receive complimentary delivery the second time round. Surprise surprise, there has been no response.

Different to Home

Ever since my first experience in NY, leaving JFK in a taxi that has a touch screen tv for the passenger seat full of useful information, news and entertainment, I knew this city was going to be nothing like what I was used to.  Sensory overload.  I thought I would keep a record to share with you the little things that are so different here and when all added up make me really feel a million miles from home.

• Taps turn different way
• Keys turn opposite way to open/lock
• light switches are up for on and down for off (seriously!)
• Food portions are huge
• A can of coke is $1, cheaper than water which can be up to $6 in bars/restaurants
• Bagels for sale everywhere including most street corners
• They don't know what a toasted sandwich is.  Toasting something means warming in an oven.
• Tampons are generally applicator only
• The chocolate kind of sucks - my favourite so far is Hersheys Cookies and Crème.  Apparently they have Mars Bars here, but I've not found where...
• Spanish is almost as common as English
• The Ben and Jerry's rocks - I'm still working my way through flavours I'd never heard of.  Really is worthy of own blog, stay tuned!
• Bacon - is only what we call the rind and is best served really really crispy.  By chance we found some 'Canadian Bacon' hidden at the back of a supermarket which is more what we are used to but at $9 for 5 pieces it is a weekend treat.
• Still sorting out the phone numbers - sometimes you put a 1 in front, sometimes you don't, very trial and error.  I asked the locals who couldn''t explain it, they just learn to know when you use a 1.
• Banking - checks are still common way to pay for bills etc
• Cell phones - you get charged to receive texts and calls by the min
• They call it ham, but we really know it as spam

Lastly,  the environment - huh??
I've never considered myself to be a 'greenie' but I guess in Australia we have slowly changed our ways to be subconsciously aware of certain environmental issues.  Water conservation. Recycling. Phasing out supermarket plastic bags.  In Manhattan, an island of 8 million people there is no such consciousness.  A plastic bag (usually twice the size of what you are carrying) is given away for every purchase, even the smallest toiletry, a can of drink or sandwich for lunch.  Clearly no need for water conservation, where we were living in the East Village, the taps had to run for 5 mins before the hot water reached us.  And recycling is few and far between.  At my office in Sydney I was used to recycled paper, double sided printing, and recycling bins at every desk.  The office I'm in now has one recycling bin near the printer that I think I'm the only one who uses it (it is conveniently placed behind my desk) and the amount of one sided printing frightens me - maybe I am a closet greenie!

I am trying my best to embrace these differences, not to complain but it has been really difficult... I guess when I stop noticing these things I will have become a true local - there's clearly a long way to go yet!

First time to Broadway

I have so much to write about and have had so little time! The last week or so we have been busy settling into our apartment which has involved much shopping and building of furniture - stories coming soon... But today I just thought I would write about my first visit to a Broadway show.

Ash isn't so keen on going to musicals (can't understand why?) so I plan to convince all our visitors that the one thing they have to do in NY is go to a show - and take me with them :) and, well, last week, our house guest Hoodie bought me a ticket. I have a list of shows I'm keen to see and his choice wasn't one of them (I hadn't even heard of it) but off we went to see the Addam's Family.

http://www.theaddamsfamilymusical.com/

It was pouring rain as I was waiting to meet Hoodie in Times Sq so I sheltered in the giant M&M's store - a ridiculously oversized tourist junk shop (and thats coming from a lover chocolate!). Not having much time before the curtain went up, we gathered with other wet tourists in a tiny pizza shop close to the the theatre and ate a great slice of pepperoni.

Not being a fan of the tv show - am I too old or too young? I thought it was going to be a bit silly - but I thoroughly enjoyed it! I couldn't help myself, the audience was full and up for a fun night and when the opening orchestral line was the famous duduludunk {click click} the whole place clicked their fingers in time - duduludunk CLICK CLICK - and that set the atmosphere. The scenery was great, set in NY Central park, there was a lot of local NY centric jokes and the audience was kept involved slightly pantomime style by Uncle Fester. It is a new show, only opened in April so we had the quality original Broadway cast including Nathan Lane (of "the bird cage" fame) and Bebe Neuwirth (Cheers and Frasier), both Broadway veterans. The music was good, helped along by a Wednesday who belted out impressive tunes and I thought there was a resemblence to the score from Rent, though I'm not an expert!

All up, it was a fun night. I found the audience definitely different to Sydney audiences when sometimes I feel, they like to think they are experts and pick and critisize instead of just enjoy the show. This audience was vibrant and enjoying themselves which was contagious.  Thanks Hoodie!

The search for an apartment - Part II

So I finished Part I as we were heading back to the West Village to see another apartment.  The phone conversation had been something like this:

the dude - I have a great apartment being shown tonight at 7pm if you can come and see it.

me - is it a no fee apartment?

the dude - yes

me - how much is it?

the dude - what is your maximum?

me - well how much is it going for?

the dude - why don't you tell me your maximum, its a great apartment, going to go very quickly (bla bla blah)

me - $x

the dude - oh, well its on for $100 more that that but I'm sure we could negotiate down. Very good landlord, wants good tenant (bla bla blah)

Ok, so we were on our way, I had arranged to meet this guy at some intersection and realised 1/2 way there that I had left my phone at home, oh dear how were we going to find him?  While we were waiting we were getting worried we missed him but with hindsight, how silly of us, of course he would be late. We eventually met him and he wandered us into the apartment.

It was the typical pitch, and I had written it off for some reason (maybe I was just worn out from the search) and so didn't take much notice.  When we got outside and started talking about it, Ash gave me the positives about the place, and comparatively, there were many. Knowing we were running out of time to sort something we decided to go for it.

This story could drag on so I'll keep it brief, basically in 2 different trips we gave a deposit, an application fee and our application with supporting documents.  We agreed to a price (the max $ I had given on the phone) and because we had our dodgy radar blaring I even asked to see their real estate licence.   We were supposed to hear by 3pm Friday if the landlord approved our application, at which time we needed to show up and pay the rest of the upfront costs.   We were keen to hear, because that meant I wouldn't have to continue looking on the Sat.  3pm, nothing.  Ash phones, oh yes, I will call you back in 45 mins.  4pm, nothing.  Ash and I decide it was best to wait to hear from him.  5pm, nothing. Ash phones, oh yes of course, yes you have been approved and I have a deal for you why don't you come to my office and we can talk about it.  Wait - what do you mean a deal?  Well the landlord has reduced the monthly rent but (wait for it....) there's now going to be a fee. How much is the fee.  Oh, lets not talk about it on the phone, come down to see me and we can go through it.

When Ash phoned me, I was furious - the cheek of the guy!!! I was ready to say go stick yourself just for the principle and he had gotten under our skin as a sleazy, unreliable, smooth talking guy.  We worked how much we were willing to pay, in order to work out even over the 12 month period, and we went in and had to negotiate with the guy.  Ash did really well.  I think there was smoke coming out my ears! But we did walk out having signed a lease.  All up a good result.

To finish the story off, Mr dude promised us an air-con unit and that he would try to get us in to the apartment a few days early.  He came through with neither and is always difficult to track down.  I had a small doubt if we would get the keys at all, but we made contact with the super (24 hour caretaker of the building) last weekend and she at least knew we were coming which made us feel better.

We moved in this week.  I hadn't remembered how big it was - at least it seems that way but we don't own any furniture yet.  How lovely it was to sleep for the first night on our new bed.  Now its just time to clean and do some serious shopping!  This weekend - an important purchase, a TV :)

A New York weekend

We have had such a great weekend.  It is the Memorial Day long weekend and we have had our first visitors from Aus here to hang out.  And hang out we have!

Friday night
We meet Ash's friends, who have come to us in the East Village, in our favourite local bar.  Quite a random, small bar that attracts a diverse custom, they have happy hour and a buy1 get 1 free drinks offer - definitely the cheapest drinks we'll have all weekend.   We then went on to a restaurant on the lower East side called Freemans.  Ash and I had eaten there a week ago and enjoyed the food and atmosphere and thought the boys would like it too.  (Not to mention that Ash thought they would also like the waitress!).  A great night of catching up and red wine :)

Saturday
Yummy brunch including hamburgers and fries for the boys,  I went the cream cheese on bagel option but with some home fried potatoes on the side.  This was followed by the boys going for an old fashioned blade shave that left PJ a bit bloody.  Then we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and wandered around the area called Dumbo on the other side.

At 5.30 we met at the Port Authority bus station for our journey into New Jersey to see the Bon Jovi concert at the newly built Meadowlands stadium.  We almost needed oxygen tanks we were so high up but what a great atmosphere with 70,000 plus fans enjoying some classics like Dead or Alive.  It was  strange to see many people in the car park with deck chairs, eskies and bbq's, they had obviously been there all day, I'm not positive but I wonder if they actually just stayed outside and listened to the concert from there?

Sunday
Another yummy brunch, this time a little more gourmet, only one of the boys went for a burger and fries!  I had the most scrumptious lemon and ricotta pancakes smothered in maple syrup.  It all went down very well with our 2 jugs of sangria!

Brunch was just the warm up, this time we got on the subway and went out to the Bronx and Yankee Stadium for an afternoon of baseball.  I learned loads about the game, by the end of the 9th inning even knew most of what was going on.  The beers nearly killed us cheap aussies at, wait for it, $10 a beer!!  We had great fun sitting in the bleechers (I didn't know until now that this means sitting on long benches as opposed to individual chairs - probably the equivalent of the old hill at the SCG - the cheap seats), bought the caps, met some locals, tried the really awful chicken tenders and fries that were cooked 6 hours earlier and cost me $10.50, and best of all, in the 7th inning, the Yankees scored 5 runs and won the game to the cries of the ecstatic crowd.

I left the boys at a beer garden for a bit of quiet time and met up with them later for dinner in China Town.  We completely overate but enjoyed the meal including a whole duck being delivered to us for peking duck pancakes.  We wandered for a bit afterward into Little Italy which was pumping and then into a dodgy street fair that included alley games where you win cheap stuffed animals.  We got roped into what turned out to be the most dodgy stall which was a complete hustle - you had to roll some small balls onto a board of numbers which the guy would add up and would correspond to another number.  After the 2 first free rolls he tried to tell us our results were mega lucky and that we would win an xBox or playstation if we kept playing but after spending $15 we all agreed to walk away...

Monday
No time for brunch this morning, we grabbed a bagel on the run as we were meeting at 9.30 to go on the Circle line 3 hour tourist cruise around Manhattan.  It was a perfect sunny day and we slapped on the sunscreen as we waited to leave the dock.  What a great way to see the sights including the best views of the Statue of Liberty and get a comprehensive commentary on New York.

When we finished we were right beside the massive USS Iwo Jima, a US Marines aircraft carrier so we took the opportunity to join the queue and go aboard.  We couldn't see the whole queue and we didn't know it would take us nearly 2 hours until we reached the gang plank in the heat, but it was worth the wait.  In town for Memorial Day and the associated Fleet week we were able to climb over tanks, missile launchers, harrier jets and helicopters.  You can imagine Ash was in his element and as a regular watcher of the military channel was able to provide all sorts of details along the way.

It was great to meet the Marines, they were very polite and very particular about answering any questions with full detail.  It also occurred to us as they showing off the million dollar toys that they were so very young and had already completed multiple deployments including Iraq.

Phew - what a weekend - I'm exhausted!
I have left the boys alone for dinner tonight as I have to be at work for a 7am call in the morning!

The search for an apartment - Part I

I had a week to find an apartment for us before I had to start work.  I was expecting it to be tough having read and heard stories about the real estate market in NY but this was even harder than expected.

The thing is they have a intermediary level in the market called brokers.  And brokers charge a commission (around 15% annual rent, sometimes negotiable) that can equate to thousands of dollars - literally.  This is in addition to the upfront costs of 1 months rent for security, 1 months rent in advance, and because we were foreigners I was told that sometimes they need an extra month deposit.  Rounding figures but that could realistically be $20k we needed to hand over in a few days...

The first thing you learn about brokers is that they are generally unreliable and untrustworthy.  From what we had learned we wanted to try and skip the broker altogether and get a 'no-fee' apartment.  This seemed easy enough as we had seen plenty advertised on a website called craigslist.  They are typically the landlord advertising directly or the landlord is paying the broker fee for some reason.  So I set out to find some of these.

We had discussed what was important to us in a property, knowing that we would be signing at least a 12 month lease.  On the list were natural light, 2 bedrooms or enough room to comfortably fit us and the many visitors we are hoping to have,  internal washing machine, decent kitchen (oh my goodness, they use the word 'kitchenette' loosely here) as we planned to cook regularly, not too many flights of stairs.  We had also decided where we wanted to be - either in the East or West Village.

Here are some words to describle properties in NY that would have an impact on price:
Walk-up (no elevator in the building and sometimes you could be on the 6 or 7th floor)
Elevator buiding (obvious)
Doorman building (concierge on site - handy for parcel and dry-cleaning deliveries, as no one does their own laundry)
Loft - Im still not really clear, but usually has large windows and an open mezzanine type level
Duplex - 2 stories but within a large hotel style building

I must have seen 20+ properties, and only a few were what we were after, some were too noisy, in large soulless blocks, terrible location, tiny, 6 flights up etc.  I spent an hour with a guy who had advertised a no fee apartment only to ask me at the end to sign something to say that I would pay him a commission.  I learned that most of the advertisements on craigslist are by brokers who advertise no-fee, but as soon as you phone, that apartment is not available but they had another to show me, with a small fee.  I became very clear in my initial conversations over the phone that we were only after no-fee.

I spent 2 days with a lovely girl traipsing from east to west and back again to see no-fee apartments, but none that we would live in.  Then came "well, we have I think what you are after but there is a fee", I went to see them, and they were lovely but the fee wasn't negotiable in this instance.  It was so frustrating.

We learned that leases in NY are generally only available on the first day of the month (sometimes also on the 15th) so that the earliest we would be moving would be the beginning of June.  The competition was tough and brokers were putting the pressure on as they could lease apartments within a day of them being available.  We also learned that coming into summer was the busiest time for rentals as all the graduating students from college were losing their student housing and needed new accommodation.

I registered online to a website called "skipbrokers.com - New York's number one community for no broker fee apartments" - sounds too good to be true? I thought skeptically as I registered to get further details.  It was very slick, I received an email saying "we have found a property for you" Then I get a call from another friendly girl who wants to meet me to show me an apartment - great I say.  I then go and see the most amazing apartment that I have seen all week which turns out is outside our max price (by $600!) and has a fee.  Skip brokers, my *ss! I was so dejected at this stage that if Ash would have been able to stand in the bedroom I would have been tempted...

I was getting more frustrated and worried that we wouldn't find something before I started work and searching had been a full time job.  On the Thursday night I received a call from someone who I had emailed a few days earlier about an ad but not had a response.  They had another apartment that was available and being shown that night.  I was exhausted, Ash and I had just seen a some in the East Village, one of which we were very close to taking but I must have had a feeling because even though it was an effort to get back to the West Village we decided to go.

To be continued...

Arriving in a Concrete Jungle Where Dreams Are Made Of

Like the words from the Alicia Keys song "Empire State of Mind" that was released around the time we made the decision to come to NYC and I've been singing ever since, I have come to this city full of excitement and anticipation for the adventures that lay ahead.

Arriving for the first time late at night, I was nervous that for some reason Immigration wouldn't let me in. The nerves were lessened by multiple signs in the Immigration Hall that read something like "Our Pledge to you" and went on say they promise to be polite, friendly, professional and will treat people with respect etc. The Officer, when I started to talk too much about my situation was like "No problem, you can come and go as you like with this visa" - Phew that was a relief! I'm in!!

It was also a great relief to find Ash waiting for me in the Arrivals Hall. We hadn't seen each other for 6 weeks and were excited to finally be together again.

Taking a cab to the East Village where we have set up temporarily until a more permanent arrangement is found, my first impressions of the City was wow, I expected it to be busy but this place is pumping! Block after block there are people everywhere and the later it gets on a Saturday evening (and I have since learnt, any night of the week!) the more people are out and about.

I had a couple of days to wander about before our NY adventure was paused as Ash and I headed to Europe for a pre-planned holiday in the UK, France and Spain. During those days Ash was working so I was left to find my bearings in the city - which you think would be easy, being a grid design - but my usual good sense of direction disappeared with the massive blocks and massive buildings that were surrounding me. Thankfully armed with a good handbag map I was able to explore. I even mastered the subway (I have been on it twice so far!) but on my second journey, to Central Park for a run, I even changed lines and made it home without any wrong turns!

Now, after a brilliant holiday, we are back in Manhattan - yes, they let me in again, with a work visa no less - and the real adventure has begun.  Stay tuned for the first hurdle....  finding somewhere to live.