A trip to Swedish furniture giant IKEA can be exciting, with its colourfully-named products (dagstorp sofa or flärdfull candle, anyone?) and the promise of meatballs (köttbullar) too.
But it can also be a frightful experience, when aisles are packed and queues snake around the store – especially when we’re all being careful about our personal space.
So take a tip from Google and visit Nottingham's branch of IKEA outside of peak times, avoiding the risk of crushes and queues.
Read more: What happened when we visited Ikea at Giltbrook Retail Park
The search engine’s Popular Times tool shows visitor numbers to a business at a particular time of day, averaged from customer reports submitted over the last several months.
It also shows live updates at the time of day a search for the store is performed, suggesting how current visitor numbers stack up against the average.
As you might expect, most people go furniture shopping at the weekend. This is true of IKEA Nottingham customers as much as anywhere else.
Google’s data shows shopper numbers are around 50 per cent higher on Saturdays than midweek, with shorter Sunday opening hours squashing visits into an even smaller window.
If you must grab that flatpack wardrobe on a weekend, then before 10am and after 6pm are your best bet on a Saturday (when the store opens at 9am and closes at 9pm, as on weekdays).
Sunday trading is from 11am to 5pm only – aim to get there before noon or after 3pm, if you want to avoid peak times.
But your best bet for low-stress, socially distanced shopping remains weekdays, particularly before 11am and after 7pm.
There’s also a daily lull at around 3pm, especially on Thursdays and Fridays, so a late lunch break might reap rewards here. (Be warned though, this dip doesn’t happen on weekends.)
So whether you’re kitting out your house or just filling your belly, choose your visiting time wisely and make your trip as avkopplande (relaxing) as possible.
Just bear in mind that the Popular Times tool – like the Google translation employed above – may not be totally reliable all of the time.
