Ingvar Kamprad, Elmtaryd and Agunnaryd

Dear Valued Customer,

Recently, you wrote a letter asking what is the key to our success...

If there are pillows being sold for four dollars to your right, and bath mats on sale for ten dollars to your left, and straight ahead is a bin of pot holders for fifty cents, doesn't it SEEM that everything in the general area is an absolute bargain?

You buy three pillows. Pillows are never sold for four dollars, that's lunacy. A bath mat for twelve dollars? Throw it in the cart, another bargain. And fifty cents can't buy you a soda these days, let alone a very useful and reliable pot holder. That pot holder might out last a current friendship or pet. For fifty cents, you can purchase what could eventually be a permanent fixture in your home, and homes to come! An investment! Or you could place it in the nearest gutter on your way home and feel no regret, as you most likely lost two quarters in the shuffle of couches and laundry and life that very morning. You don't really love the pattern on the pot holder, but you won't find one for less than fifty cents anywhere. In fact, you have a brief feeling of admiration- not only for pot holder's cost vs. value, but for yourself! You bask in a brief semi-conscious spotlight that makes you just that much smarter than other consumers for having discovered this wonderland of bargains. You barely perceive this feeling, but it moves you forward- smirking through the store, enabling purchases like a $1 wooden spoon, a $5 little rug, a $2 metal plate that might be for a candle, but you're not sure.

Our answer... Most bath mats are cheaper than twelve dollars.

Love,

IKEA