Ikea is retail Marmite: for some, the mere mention of the name sends shudders down the spine, but for others it’s the happy prospect of a half day spent meandering around the shop’s curious (and rigorously enforced) one-way-system, followed by several hours fiddling with an allen key while nursing a bad back and trying to avoid a family bust up.
Love it or loathe it (and I love it), Ikea turned furniture retailing on its head and brought Scandinavian design into the reach of millions of customers, continuing its entrepreneurial style through the decades and always staying ahead of the curve.
So, when Ikea’s head of sustainability claimed last year that we’ve reached “peak stuff”, it struck a chord with me. Stuff, clutter, call it what you like, there’s a growing sense that too many things are crowding into our lives and our thinking. I’ve just been introduced to Marie Kondo and her magic art of tidying up (see it for yourself at tidying-up.com), and while she may be a bit extreme for some, she represents a growing movement to streamline our surroundings and invest our money in fewer throwaway goods.
For those of us in travel, this is an opportunity to seize. The rise of the experience economy – the investment in memories over things – is only going to increase in the years ahead. The phrase “you are what you eat” is not strictly true, as evidenced by the lack of similarity between say, me and a bag of cheese and onion crisps. A more appropriate saying might be “you are where you go” – the memories made, the relationships nurtured and occasions celebrated are all central to shaping who you are.
The Kuoni annual trends report, which we create using insight from our Personal Travel Experts, is out next week. Every year the popularity of certain destinations goes up and comes down, but one thing is overwhelmingly clear – travel has never been more in demand. Our customers are choosing to travel to celebrate life’s big milestones more than ever before.
More and more, people are realising that they don’t need more things – generally speaking, one sofa in the living room is all you really need, one big telly on the wall, one set of Blue Denby crockery and so on… life isn’t better with more stuff, it’s worse. It’s time to forget gifts that people don’t want or need. People want experiences, and the best experience of all is travel.
Every year the team at Kuoni arrange thousands of special trips, leaving customers with memories they will treasure forever. I still firmly believe that conversations are an essential holiday ingredient; from planning them in the first place to remembering them in the years that follow. And with all due respect to Ingvar Kamprad, we want more conversations that last a lifetime and fewer tables that last a lunchtime.
Derek Jones is chief executive, UK of Der Touristik
