It can save your marriage

So I was going to write a post about the current Ikea commercial campaign. You know the ones where the people are happy in their, so called, domestic bliss and the narrator (is it David Hyde Pierce? If its not, the guy sure sounds like him) talks about how their life would be ruined if it weren’t for organizational fantastic-ness of Ikea furniture.

At first I found these ads to be amusing but as I saw them more and more my mind quickly changed as I paid attention to what was being shown. Now I find these commercials to be overly mean and portrait the women in them to be horrible bitchy individuals who are quick to insult, hurt, and ridicule. I am irritated every time I see one.

There is the one where a family sits in front of the television enjoying whatever is happening on screen. The father walks into the room with a hot cup of coffee and sits down ready to join the fun. But the voice over is about how if the place wasn’t so organized because of Ikea, he would have slipped on a DVD case, throwing coffee on his child’s favourite stuffed toy “killing it”, making the child scream and cry, and the wife saying, “You’ve ruined my life.” I personally find that kind of harsh.

Or what about the one where the guy opens a wardrobe door to find a wall of shoes perfectly organized, pulls open a draw removing and unrolling a tie. His wife sits at a dressing table applying final touches to her makeup and fixing her hair. They flash happy smiles of contentment and bliss at one another. But the narrator contradicts this scene with talk of a wall of footwear collapsing on top of the husband making him swear. They argue for a moment and she quickly comes back with a comment about his small feet.

The last one in the series involves a young couple having breakfast in their immaculate Ikea kitchen. The sun streams in the windows as the, I’m assuming husband, opens a cupboard removing a box of cereal as the wife sits at the island in a stool already eating. The scene is calm. Again the narrator goes against this sereneness and interjects vile hostility.  If it weren’t for the perfectly organized space the husband would have had to ask where his “Organic Crunchie Bites” were only to be slapped with a volatile “I am not your mother, David.” Creating a wall between the two of them as the fight continues and he ends up in the “proverbial dog house.”

I mean if all it takes to save a marriage is a trip to Ikea and a little organization I think any marriages would be saved. The world would be filled with well Swedish-furnished homes and smiling faces. But I think all it does is mask the dysfunction, distain, and distrust that exists in the family unit. It is sad really.

But alas I could not find the videos online to share with you. I found a lot of their older ads that were lighter, more fun, and entertaining. These were my favourites.

Garage Talk

Sale

Dance

That last one is kind of creepy the way they bend and move.

Oh well. I will have to find something else to write about.

Tra

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