The gift that keeping on giving - in a good way!

IKEA walks the talk.  

After finding that 20% of its Danish customers biked to IKEA, the world's biggest put-it-together-yourself furniture chain, provided bike trailers to enable their Danish customers to get the household products home!

Here in North America, IKEA USA really does believe that Change Begins at Home!  Each of its 12,400 U.S. employees were given bikes for Christmas.


No assembly required!!!!!!
"IKEA notes that riding a bicycle 30 minutes a day can burn a number of calories equivalent to an individual shedding 30 lbs. Cycling just 30km a week can help reduce the risk of coronary heart disease by 50%. Riding a bike versus owning and driving a car can also save an individual $8,000 annually in automobile-related costs (gasoline, general car maintenance, and insurance costs)."  It's the gift that keeps on giving in a good way!  Healthier employees, also take less time off, lower the company's health costs and are happier!


Sadly, Canadian employees didn’t get bikes.  However, IKEA Canada commissioned Canadian artists to produce 5,000 unique pieces, one-of-a-kind art for their annual co-worker holiday gift, supporting Canadian talent and artists.   

No Assembly!

Let's hope, the bike, as a company Christmas gift is a prelude of great things to come!  Hopefully other retailers, and companies jump on the bandwagon and offer their employees bikes sweetened with a uniquely Canadian 1 year free service program at MEC.  It would require confident, forward thinking CEOs and management to embrace this idea.  I'll wager that an Return on Investment analysis would show the company would recoup its investment many times over.
Thanks for your comments and emails.
Merry Christmas to all!