IKEA is a privately-held, international home product retailer that sells flat pack furniture, accessories, and bathroom and kitchen items in its retail stores around the world. The company, which pioneered flat-pack design furniture at affordable prices, is now the world's largest furniture manufacturer. Much of IKEA's furniture is designed to be assembled by the consumer rather than being sold pre-assembled.

In response to the explosion of human population and material expectations in the 20th and 21st centuries, the company implements economies of scale, capturing material streams and creating manufacturing processes that hold costs and resource use down, such as the extensive use of particle board. The intended result is flexible, adaptable home furnishings, scalable both to smaller homes and dwellings, as well as large houses.

 

This is stuff that everybody knows by now, but what many don't know is that IKEA is allegedly testing the field in the automotive industry.

 

This is only a rumor, as there is no official information available just yet. All we know is that the car concept goes by the name of Leko and is supposed to be an environmentally-friendly vehicle. Designed by Christophe Grozs, the car is a modular design that can operate as a coupe or as a convertible, and has the full backing of the World Wildlife Fund France.

 

We'll resist the temptation to make a joke about how you'll be directed by some cheesy stick figure drawings to assemble the car yourself with nothing more than a five-page word-free manual. The source of the news is a fairly official-looking website from France, which is odd considering that IKEA is based in Sweden. The supposed unveiling of the Leko is scheduled for... wait for it... April 1.

 

No further details are offered, and other information about the car is scarce, so we'll just have to sit back and make jokes about home assembly and poorly veneered fiberboard until we get the complete story at the end of the month.

 

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