IKEA stores designed to confuse customers out of their money

According to architecture professor Alan Penn, there is more to IKEA’s confusing layout than meets the eye. The maze-like architecture is all part of a clever plan to confuse customers into making unnecessary impulse purchases.

According to Penn, the way it works is this: first people must go through the warehouse to see what they want, then follow a set path to get to that item. It’s this path that often confuses people and brings them to areas they wouldn’t have gone if they didn’t need to follow the IKEA path.

Here the trick is that because the lay-out is so confusing you know you won’t be able to go back and get it later. So you pop it in your trolley as you go past.

Penn also says consumers are forced to go through IKEA’s marketplace where the majority of impulse buying happens on things not on the shopping list like cheap light bulbs and candles. So next time you’re confused at IKEA remember it’s what they want – and if you realize you have something you don’t need you can always slip those light bulbs into the glassware section. [Telegraph]