Making Swedes Feel At Home In A Series Of Slovenian Ads That Mock IKEA

Local furniture merchant Lesnina greets Ikea with a series of ads that the public immediately labeled as legendary.

Let’s face it. It’s hard to compete with global giants, such as Ikea. But as it turns out, it is not impossible. Lesnina, established slovenian furniture merchant, learned global competition can be a great springboard for creativity and humor.

For decades, all-day-shopping-trips to Ikea in Italy, Austria and Croatia were a part of Slovenian home decoration culture. Naturally, Ikea’s opening in Slovenia, was expected to be THE event of 2021. On the day of Ikea’s grand opening, Lesnina, market leader that has been present on the market for more than 70 years, launched a campaign that overshadowed the opening of Ikea Slovenia.

While creating a campaign for Lesnina, Slovenian creative agency Futura DDB wondered … What would Swedes find fascinating if they visited Lesnina? This question helped them identify Lesnina’s 3 competitive advantages – furniture delivery and assembly, sales people and offer of premium brands furniture.

You can see vidoes here:

https://youtu.be/s4AkvcOLPqs

https://youtu.be/Od1wqCTEksc

https://youtu.be/dYuT1O_riYw

“It looks like they will deliver it to their home … And assemble it for them. Crazy,” goes the conversation of Swedes while looking at the family that just bought a new kitchen in Lesnina.

Bilingual campaign Dobrodošli doma – Välkommen hem translates as welcome home (which is also Lesnina’s tagline). Campaign’s main elements are 3 parody ads that the public immediately labeled as legendary. “Best ad in a long time”, “I like Ikea, but after seeing this, I will definitely reward Lesnina by buying something” and “If all ads were like that I wouldn’t mute the TV during the commercial break” are some of the responses from the audience. “We knew the audience would like the ad, but we had no idea it would be so successful. We even got some free publicity in the media, even on national TV,” says creative director Zoran Gabrijan.

The campaign was rounded with a rather hedonistic reinterpretation of Ikea’s assembly instructions. “Since they are redundant for Lesnina’s customers we turned them into enjoyment instructions that suggest how a customer can enjoy their new piece of furniture,” concluded Zoran Gabrijan from Futura DDB.

https://youtu.be/s4AkvcOLPqs

https://youtu.be/Od1wqCTEksc

https://youtu.be/dYuT1O_riYw

For more information please contact:

Branka Bizjak Zabukovec

Futura DDB, Slovenia

branka.bizjak@futura.si

https://www.futura.si/en

More info: youtu.be

Making Swedes Feel At Home In A Series Of Slovenian Ads That Mock IKEA