The teams working on the IKEA range are always looking for new ways to package IKEA products. Because cleverly packed products mean more packages per pallet and more pallets per truck. Fuller trucks mean fewer vehicles on the road and lower CO2 emissions. For customers it means lower prices (because less is spent on packing and shipping) and products that are easier to transport home. Today, about 3.5% of the total emissions from IKEA operations worldwide come from the energy used to transport products. With shipments moving among suppliers, distribution centres and finally stores, efficient packaging is key. The aim is to ship more products and less air. The all-important “fill rate” is the space in trucks and containers that’s actually used. This year the goal to increase the fill rate from 62% to 70% was reached. It’s a lot more than it sounds since weight restrictions often prevent filling containers and trucks to the top. Henrik Preutz, Designer, IKEA of Sweden AB, explains the importance of filling pallets: “Together with the rest of the team we have to make sure that as many products as possible can fit on a pallet.
This is crucial because the more we save in transportation costs, the more we can invest in quality and function so in the end a good IKEA product can be delivered to the customer.” Packaging and shipping are part of the creation process from day one for the designers developing new IKEA products. This unique way of working is at the heart of producing the best products at the best price and is “what makes my job interesting!” says Henrik. He continues, “You have to work hard, dare to be creative and even try to use these set boundaries to your advantage to make a good product that looks beautiful and has great function even though it’s been squeezed into a minimal box.” What makes a product easy to pack? The rule of thumb is that unassembled products will be easier to flat pack if they can be as small and square as possible. It takes several competences to achieve this, merging the know-how of suppliers, product developers, designers and engineers. This year the classic IKEA shelving series EXPEDIT was updated and renamed KALLAX.
The main difference is a robust frame that has been made thinner and lighter, making less weight to transport. After seven months, increased filling rates saved 1,300 truckloads and lowered CO2 emissions by 5%. KNOPPARP was another product launched in 2014. This handy sofa weighs only 16kg and comes in a small flat pack that can easily be transported home on public transport. And then there’s LEJEN, a new bathroom cabinet that has been adapted to the size of a pallet to fit more into each truckload. Another product group we’ve been squeezing air out of for years is mattresses. They are big, bulky things to transport, both for shippers and customers. But roll packing means they use up to a third less space. Continually minimising the air that’s transported and reducing packaging materials is vital in the drive to lower emissions and costs. All this while ensuring products arrive damage free and easy for customers to take home and assemble. IKEA of Sweden Packaging Engineer, Björn Götesson, explains: “In the future I imagine that new and groundbreaking materials will open up opportunities to further improve our products and packing.
The work simply never ends.”Over the past three years an escalating conflict in Syria has forced almost three million people to seek safety in neighboring countries in the Middle East. In that time, more than two-hundred and fifty thousand people have made the tough journey over the border into the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of Iraq. As part of its partnership with UNHCR, and in an effort to provide comfort and support to those refugees, IKEA Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the global furnishings company, is making a USD $2.5 million in-kind donation of bedroom products to UNHCR for refugees in Iraq. “When conflicts turn peoples’ lives upside down, we believe in supporting children and families who have lost everything by donating IKEA products that will give them a sense of security and home,” said Jonathan Spampinato, Head of Strategic Planning and Communications, at the IKEA Foundation. 36-year old Abdu Rahman Khalil was one of the first residents to line up to receive two mattresses, quilts and pillow covers, specially suitable for summer use in Iraq, where daytime temperature can exceed 45 degrees.
Abdu, his wife Sita and their six children fled Syria’s civil war last September for the comparative safety of northern Iraq’s Kurdistan region. Now they live at the UNHCR-administered Arbat refugee camp near the city of Sulymaniah. Abdu says being able to sleep better will make life more comfortable for the whole family, “We needed these mattresses and blankets. The blankets are thin and good for the summer and the mattresses are very good quality.” Whilst the IKEA Foundation, UNHCR’s largest private sector donor, has previously supported UNHCR’s work with Syrian refugees in both Jordan and Lebanon through in-kind donations, this is its first donation to UNHCR in Iraq, and it is a welcome one for 52-year old Halima Murad. She and her family, along with 3,000 others in the camp, were among more than 35,000 refugees who arrived in a mass influx from Syria last August. Since arriving in Sulymaniah, all six of her family members have lived in the cramped quarters of a single tent, at the mercy of Iraq’s extreme and harsh winters, summers and dust storms.
In the winter temperatures can drop to zero and in the summer they soar to 45 degrees. Halima says,” We are happy to receive this mattress and quilt. We don’t have blankets for summer, only winter blankets and they are too heavy.” Specifically this donation consists of 150,000 mattresses, quilts and bed linens and will be distributed to refugees at the Arbat camp, in the governate of Sulymaniah, over the next year. 50,000 sets have already arrived, and the rest are scheduled for delivery in staggered shipments until March 2015. In agreement with IKEA Foundation, UNHCR will distribute 80,000 mattresses to internally placed people inside Iraq, who are have been forced out of their homes due to recent fighting between armed groups and government forces. On July 22, 1,866 mattresses were delivered to 311 families who have fled to the municipality of Al Hamdaniya, in Ninawah province in northern Iraq. Sleep On It: The Mattress Guide Daylight saving time putting a dent in your sleep?