An error by shop fitters trapped 29 people in an Ikea store in Belgium for four days. Work on the store upgrade began on a Saturday evening, shortly before the store closed for four days. 29 shoppers with their final purchases (plant of the week, tea candles, picture frames called Smeg, etc.) were unable to find the tills and eventually realised that they were walking round in circles behind the builders hoardings. The final security sweep, that checks for students trying to get locked in overnight, did not find the trapped shoppers.
The shoppers’ cries for help went unheard for four days, muffled by the soft furnishings. They slept on the display beds each night. By day, they amused themselves with sack races in blue shopping bags, and kept score with tiny pencils. They survived by eating copious amounts of lingonberry jam, and were forced to use the store’s bathroom department, despite the lack of working plumbing.
After four days, the trapped shoppers had fashioned an escape ladder and managed to attract the attention of a shop fitter scoffing meatballs. The emergency services treated many of the newly released victims for hand injuries resulting from the overuse of tiny Allen keys. One shopper had his stomach pumped to address a serious overdose of Swedish fruit.
A spokesman for the store chain apologised for the error and said that the 29 victims would obviously receive a generous 5% discount on their shopping and some complimentary Daim bars. They would also be memorialised forever by having a well-designed, highly-tested and cheap-to-produce furniture item named after each one of them.
Image: Photo by Adam Kolmacka on Unsplash