By Mark Wilson

马克·威尔逊(Mark Wilson)

Ikea has long known the shortcomings of its business. The world’s largest furniture manufacturer kept prices low by selling flat-packed goods out of its giant stores, all while it was slow to respond to the digital revolution of apps and e-commerce. In January, Jesper Brodin, CEO of Ikea’s parent company, Ingka Group, acknowledged as much and told Fast Company that Ikea was “investing like never before” in its digital platforms and home delivery.

宜家早就知道其业务的缺点。 这家全球最大的家具制造商通过在其大型商店中出售平装产品来保持低价，而对应用程序和电子商务的数字革命的React却很慢。 1月，宜家母公司Ingka Group的首席执行官Jesper Brodin对此表示认可，并告诉Fast Company ，宜家在其数字平台和送货上门方面“进行了前所未有的投资”。

But customers have yet to see the return on that investment. In the months since COVID-19 hit, closed Ikea stores and social distancing forced customers to pre-order items online, then pick them up in person, a system Ikea calls “Click & Collect.” Alternatively, customers could get large items delivered for a flat fee of $49.

但是客户尚未看到该投资的回报。 自从COVID-19流行以来的几个月中， 宜家关闭了商店，并且社会疏远迫使顾客先在线预订商品，然后亲自取货，宜家将其称为“点击并收集”。 或者，客户可以按49美元的固定费用获得大件物品。

Ikea tells us its e-commerce business doubled over this time. But without the capacity to handle it, Ikea has fielded widespread customer complaints. We’ve seen stories of unfulfilled orders, inept customer service, and even, in one case, a 500-mile drive to pick up furniture that was marked “out of stock” 30 minutes before the customers arrived. Even now, as Ikeas have reopened around the United States, these problems haven’t been solved.

宜家告诉我们，其电子商务业务在这段时间内翻了一番。 但是由于没有能力处理，宜家已经引起了广泛的客户投诉。 我们已经看到了未履行的订单，客户服务不力的故事，甚至在一个案例中，是在客户到达30分钟前驱车500英里来取回标记为“缺货”的家具的故事。 即使现在，当宜家在美国各地重新开放时，这些问题仍未解决。

“We are sorry customers have had challenges with their orders and for the inconvenience and disappointment this has caused,” Ikea offered in a statement to Fast Company, declining to make a representative available for an interview. “Like many retailers and other businesses, Ikea U.S. has been impacted by COVID-19 in many ways.”

宜家在给Fast Company的一份声明中表示：“我们很遗憾客户在订单方面遇到了挑战，给客户带来了不便和失望，但拒绝让代表接受采访。 “像许多零售商和其他企业一样，宜家美国在许多方面也受到COVID-19的影响。”

恐怖故事 (The Horror Stories)

The stories we’ve come across, from both readers and disgruntled customers on the internet, are long, intricate yarns, in which a seemingly simple order spirals out of control, sending shoppers into customer service hell.

读者和互联网上不满的客户所遇到的故事都是漫长而错综复杂的故事，其中看似简单的订单一发不可收拾，使购物者陷入困境。

As Roxana Elliot, who works in marketing, tells us, “I ordered a closet set to be delivered from Ikea, ordered on July 5 for delivery on the 30th so a longish lead time, but I was fine with that given the challenges I know they are having around COVID. On the 20th I got an email that seemed to indicate it was still on track saying it was being picked from their warehouses, and then just on the 28th I got another email abruptly saying it has been canceled with little explanation other than due to delays.”

正如行销部门的Roxana Elliot告诉我们的那样：“我下令从宜家订购壁橱，并于7月5日订购了30天交货，因此交货期很长，但是鉴于我所面临的挑战，我对此表示满意他们有关于COVID。 20日，我收到一封电子邮件，似乎表明它仍在按时说正在从他们的仓库中取货，然后正好28日，我突然收到另一封电子邮件，说它已被取消，除了延误外，几乎没有其他解释。 ”

Elliot tried calling customer service only to be hung up on by automated systems. Ikea support on Twitter ghosted her as well. Ultimately, she got a cancellation letter out of the blue along with a refund, and she ended up going to her store to buy the items herself. What she still doesn’t understand is, if the items were out of stock at her local store, why didn’t Ikea suggest similar items that were in stock?

艾略特(Elliot)试图打电话给客户服务，只是被自动化系统挂断了。 推特上的宜家支持也使她感到困惑。 最终，她突然收到了取消通知和退款，最终她自己去商店买了东西。 她仍然不明白的是，如果这些物品在她的本地商店中缺货，为什么宜家不建议有类似物品出现在库存中？

The experience of a consultant named Thomas Urwin echoes much of this story. He ordered furniture in July, anticipating delays due to COVID-19. He was promised a delivery date of July 28th.

一位名叫Thomas Urwin的顾问的经历与这个故事很相似。 他在7月订购了家具，因为COVID-19预计会延迟。 他被承诺交付日期为7月28日。

“After several false starts due to busy phone lines and calls that simply ended because Ikea customer support was receiving too many calls, I got through to someone who told us the delivery would not be coming today. Or tomorrow. They couldn’t say when the delivery would come, because the items on order were not in the warehouse. Or in the country. They didn’t know,” Thomas writes. “At least one item has been discontinued since we placed the order, which Ikea didn’t seem concerned about enough to inform or issue a refund. The customer service agent offered to transfer us to a specialist, at which point we were put through to another line which simply told us that due to the volume of calls, our call could not be completed, and cut us off again.”

“由于繁忙的电话线路而导致几次错误的开始，并且由于宜家客户支持收到太多电话而仅仅结束了通话，之后我接到一个告诉我们今天交货的人的电话。 或者明天。 他们无法确定何时交货，因为订购的物品不在仓库中。 还是在国内。 他们不知道，”托马斯写道。 “自从我们下订单以来，至少有一件商品已经停产，宜家对此似乎并不担心，不足以告知或发出退款。 客户服务代理人提出将我们转移给专家，这时我们转到了另一条线路，该行简单地告诉我们，由于呼叫量很大，我们的呼叫无法完成，因此又切断了我们的联系。”

After several more calls, he was offered the options of canceling his order or scheduling a new delivery date — September 9. But there was a big catch. It was possible the items might not be in stock, yet again, and by September 9 he would be in the exact same situation. He learned his local store would be restocked with the items August 1, but for whatever reason, that store couldn’t just ship them upon receipt. He’d have to go in during the pandemic, and rent a car to get there, since he doesn’t own one. (He also scored a $75 gift card for his troubles.)

在再打几次电话后，他可以选择取消订单或安排新的交货日期(9月9日)。但是收获很大。 可能这些物品可能没有库存了，到9月9日，他将处于完全相同的情况。 他了解到，他的本地商店将在8月1日重新库存商品，但无论出于何种原因，该商店都无法在收到货后立即发货。 在大流行期间，他将不得不进去，并租一辆车去那儿，因为他没有车。 (他还因自己的麻烦而获得了75美元的礼品卡。)

Reddit’s Ikea group has a whole thread dedicated to hell stories, with new ones piling up every day. One was a case of what happens when you rent a car and drive way too far to grab the “in stock” item. “My sister and [brother-in-law] are really upset right now,” Reddit user Cyberburn wrote on August 23. “They made the 500+ miles round trip to Ikea to pick up their Click and Collect order on Friday, and it was cancelled 30 minutes before they arrived. My brother-in-law took off work to make this trip. The same thing happened to me a year ago, but the employees were able to ship the few missing parts to me. I’m just surprised that this is still an issue. It’s one thing if you live nearby; it’s a whole different thing if you are driving from far away and only for Ikea.”

Reddit的宜家团队有一个专门讨论地狱故事的话题，每天都有新话题在堆积。 一个例子是，当您租车并开得太远而无法拿到“库存”物品时，会发生什么情况。 Reddit用户Cyber​​burn在8月23日写道：“我的姐姐和(岳母)现在真的很沮丧”，“他们在宜家(Ikea)进行了500多英里的往返行程，以在星期五领取他们的“点击并收集”订单，在他们到达前30分钟被取消。 我的姐夫下班去旅行了。 一年前，我也发生了同样的事情，但是员工们却能够将一些缺少的零件运送给我。 我只是感到惊讶，这仍然是一个问题。 如果你住在附近是一回事； 如果您是从宜家开车到遥远的地方，那是完全不同的事情。”

The problems boil down to a few things. Ikea’s inventory management seems poorly updated. The company doesn’t appear to know when many items will actually be replenished, and where. In some cases, it sounds like large swaths of items are simply listed as out of stock. When they are listed as in stock and buyable, their shipments are delayed for months, and then delayed for months again. Redditor caitlineljo complained that an order she placed on June 7 is now scheduled for delivery on November 15. “I have matching storage boxes that I’m trying to coordinate with for our nursery,” she writes. “At this point, getting this damn boxes is harder than being pregnant during a pandemic.”

问题归结为几件事。 宜家的库存管理似乎更新不佳。 该公司似乎并不知道何时实际补充多少物品以及在何处补充。 在某些情况下，听起来好像很多物品都被列为缺货。 当他们被列为在股票和可买的，他们的出货量推迟了几个月，然后推迟数月一次 。 Redditor caitlineljo抱怨说，她于6月7日下达的订单现在定于11月15日交货。“我有与之匹配的储物箱，我正设法与我们的托儿所配合，”她写道。 “在这一点上，要获得该死的盒子比在大流行期间怀孕要困难得多。”

不一定要这样 (It Doesn’t Have to Be This Way)

The pandemic has been a challenge to the entire retail and service industry. But most of the giant retailers have stepped up to the moment. Companies such as Amazon, Walmart, and Target staffed up rapidly to meet demand. While not without hiccups, especially in the early months of the pandemic, these retailers have adapted and are pretty dependable right now.

大流行一直是整个零售和服务业的挑战 。 但是，大多数大型零售商都已加紧准备。 诸如亚马逊，沃尔玛和塔吉特等公司Swift配备了人员以满足需求。 尽管并非没有打h，尤其是在 大流行 的最初几个月 ，这些零售商已经适应了并且现在非常可靠。

You see analogs in the fast food industry, too. These mega-chains realized that, with dining rooms closed, customers would be funneled into drive-throughs. They rapidly updated their practices (and also hired a lot of new employees) to handle this surge.

您也可以在快餐业中看到类似物。 这些大型连锁店意识到，在饭厅关闭的情况下，顾客将被带入到直通车中。 他们Swift更新了自己的做法 (并雇用了许多新员工)来应对这种激增。

Food and generalized retail are a relevant point of comparison to Ikea, not just because they’re big and sell similar products, but because companies such as Walmart and Chipotle are chains that realized they needed to modernize and invest in all sorts of digital infrastructure — even though they did so later than competitors. Walmart only launched its modern online shopping site in 2018. Today, that experience is quite good. Chipotle launched its pickup and delivery app in the same year, while doubling food prep capacity in its stores to handle digital orders. Chipotle’s earnings are down versus 2019, but 10% to 20% less than you might expect. Analysts recognize that Chipotle’s digital evolution has a lot to do with its resilience.

与宜家相比，食品和一般零售业是一个重要的比较点，不仅因为它们规模大并且销售类似产品，而且因为沃尔玛和Chipotle等公司都是连锁店，他们意识到他们需要现代化并投资于各种数字基础设施-即使他们比竞争对手晚。 沃尔玛直到2018年才推出其现代在线购物网站。 今天，这种体验是非常好的 。 Chipotle 于同年推出了取货和送货应用程序 ，同时商店中的食品准备能力翻了一番，以处理数字订单。 Chipotle的收入与2019年相比有所下降，但比您预期的低10％至20％。 分析人士认识到，Chipotle的数字化发展与其弹性有关 。

Ikea seemed to have a similar reckoning with its digital business in 2017, but it didn’t figure things out in time for the stress test of 2020. The company confirmed that order delays are an ongoing problem under the weight of twice the online orders and new social distancing practices in warehouses.

宜家在2017年的数字业务似乎也有类似的 想法 ，但它没有及时解决2020年的压力测试。该公司确认，在两倍于在线订单和仓库中新的社会疏离做法。

The company also tells us that it’s working on these issues. Since COVID-19 struck, the store shifted to a new online system that lets customers track and cancel their orders. In some cases, Ikea is shipping products directly from its stores, though most larger furniture still comes from distribution centers. And they’re filling 200 positions in the U.S. to “develop our digital capabilities to address our customer and market needs” while recruiting new employees in order fulfillment. “We hope some of the changes we have implemented will result in a better experience going forward,” the company writes. “And, we promise to keep working on it.”

该公司还告诉我们，它正在解决这些问题。 自COVID-19袭击以来，商店转移到一个新的在线系统，该系统使客户可以跟踪和取消他们的订单。 在某些情况下，宜家直接从其商店运送产品，尽管大多数较大的家具仍来自配送中心。 他们正在填补美国的200个职位，以“开发我们的数字功能来满足客户和市场需求”，同时招聘新员工以履行职责。 该公司写道：“我们希望我们已实施的某些变更将带来更好的体验。” “而且，我们保证会继续努力。”