Due to the fact that IKEA tends to combine their actual store with a warehouse, they need a lot of space. As such, most of the time if you wanted to go to an IKEA store, they might be located out of the city and sometimes far away. However, to encourage customers to make trips to their stores, IKEA has come up with a rather novel idea.
Over in Dubai, it seems that IKEA is testing out a discount system where based on how far you’ve had to travel, you will be given a discount accordingly. This will rely on the use of Google Maps and the Timeline feature, which records the routes you take everyday. Based on that, customers can then show IKEA staff members how far they’ve had to travel to the IKEA store, and based on that, they will be given a discount.
Based on the average Dubai salary, this works out to be around $28 for one hour of travel, meaning that it is possible that customers could essentially get themselves free products the further they’ve had to travel.
However, like we said, right now the feature seems to be only available in Dubai. It is unclear if IKEA has plans to eventually roll it out to other countries they operate in, or if it is simply exclusive to Dubai. It is, however, a rather novel idea and seems to be a good way to take advantage of Google Maps’ Timeline feature.
Filed in . Read more about Apps, Google Maps and Ikea. Source: engadget