Sweden Wants to Teach You About the Places Your IKEA Furniture Is Named After
Shopping at IKEA sometimes feels like you’re taking a foreign language class — needing to remember that you like the KIVIK couch over the HÄRLANDA makes for a good brain game. But these product names are much more than just couches, beds, towels, and shelving units. The country of Sweden is eager to educate potential visitors on the places behind those now-iconic IKEA product names.
“Discover the Originals” is a new campaign launched by Visit Sweden with a goal to educate foreigners on the places their favorite IKEA products are named after (and using a touch of humor to do so). For example, BOLMEN is not just an IKEA toilet brush — it’s actually a gorgeous and serene lake in the province of Småland with water so clear you can drink from it.
“In Sweden, we are proud of IKEA. In a sense they have helped us make Swedish places world-famous through the names they borrowed for their products. Now we want to show the originals behind the product names and invite the world to discover the beautiful locations behind those names,” Nils Persson, Chief Marketing Officer, Visit Sweden, said in a press release.
“Discover the Originals” gives visitors 21 Swedish places to explore, like Järvfjället in Lapland with its cross-country skiing and hiking trails, the fishing village and art hub of Skärhamn on the island of Tjörn, and Kallax in Norrbotten, which houses thousands of small islands and plays host to Norrbotten’s annual fermented herring parties.
To explore behind the scenes of your favorite IKEA products, head over to Visit Sweden’s website to learn more about the campaign and discover where exactly you’d like to travel to first.