«To create a better everyday life for the many people.»
IKEA logo. Redesign by Seventy Agency, 2019
Introduction
IKEA «One Bag to Rule Them All», London, 2025. Photography by Marloes Haarmans
IKEA is a Swedish furniture and home goods brand founded by Ingvar Kamprad in 1943. In 1948, the company started selling furniture, which later became the core of the IKEA range. [2]
The brand is built around a simple idea: good home design should be affordable and useful for many people. This is also reflected in IKEA’s official vision: «to create a better everyday life for the many people.» [3]
For this research, IKEA is interesting because its communication is built as a very recognizable visual system. The brand works not only through advertising, but through repeated visual codes that appear across stores, products, packaging, digital platforms and everyday customer experience.
IKEA Izlog, Belgrade, 2018. Facade of a temporary IKEA space on Knez Mihailova Street designed as an oversized FRAKTA bag
IKEA positions itself as a brand of affordable, functional and democratic design. The company does not communicate furniture as luxury objects. Instead, it shows furniture as part of daily life. This is why IKEA’s communication often feels practical. The brand usually does not say “buy this because it is beautiful.” It says: this product can solve a real problem in your home.
The brand’s target audience is broad, but it especially speaks to people who want versatile design without luxury prices. IKEA’s audience is defined not only by age or income, but by a situation. For example, someone has a room, a limited budget and a practical need, and IKEA shows that this need can be solved through a clear and accessible system.
BRIMNES bed. IKEA of Sweden / K. Hagberg / M. Hagberg for IKEA, 2026
Communication Channels
IKEA communicates with its audience through various mediums, such as their website, social media, video ads, outdoor posters, printed campaigns and the store experience. Its tone is usually simple, direct and playful. The brand does not build a distant luxury image. Instead, it speaks through everyday situations.
For example, IKEA’s website is not only an online shop, but also a recognizable communication channel where inspiration, prices, product information and practical home solutions are presented in one clear IKEA language. [1]
Official IKEA website. Web interface screenshot, 2026
IKEA especially likes to communicate through advertising campaigns, where the main message is usually built around a simple, memorable idea.
IKEA «Don’t Worry, You Can Afford It» advertising campaign. INGO Hamburg for IKEA UAE, 2024
In the hidden-price campaign, the product looks like it belongs to a more expensive design brand. The campaign hides the price to challenge the idea that good materials and clean design must be expensive. [4]
A similar idea appears in the “It’s that affordable” campaign, where IKEA compares its products to everyday purchases like coffee or soda cans. [5]
In the pet campaign “Don’t Worry, You Can Afford It”, broken home objects are shown through the chaos caused by pets, turning low price into a joke rather than a dry selling point. [6]
IKEA «Hidden Prices» advertising campaign. Mother London for IKEA, 2026
IKEA «It’s That Affordable» advertising campaign. Memac Ogilvy / Dubai for IKEA Saudi Arabia, 2016
Another example is the „IKEA Brighton now open“ campaign. Here, IKEA uses a very local joke: furniture is shown with bird droppings, referring to Brighton’s seaside environment and its seagulls. The campaign keeps the same IKEA tone, where it's simple, funny and slightly unexpected, while still focusing on the product and its price. [7]
Poster series from the IKEA Brighton OOH campaign. Mother for IKEA UK, photographed by Lydia Whitmore, 2025
IKEA also often uses TV and video ads filmed like short funny sketches. Most of them are built around simple everyday situations, but sometimes the brand adds a provocative twist, turning an ordinary moment into a memorable message. [8]
Theoretical Framework
Theory of Planned Behavior
Theory of Planned Behavior explains how communication can turn a positive attitude into action. It focuses on three elements: attitude, subjective norm and perceived behavioral control. [9]
For IKEA, this means that the customer sees the brand as affordable, practical and visually pleasant; understands it as a normal and trusted choice for many people; and feels able to choose, plan, buy, deliver and assemble the product. This theory is useful because IKEA does not only make people like the brand. It makes the whole process of changing the home feel possible.
FRAKTA bag, IKEA, 2026 / IKEA store sign, author unknown, 2026
Visual Rhetoric
Visual Rhetoric explains how communication persuades through visual form. For example, images, colors, layout, composition, objects, atmosphere and spatial organization. Visual rhetoric is often described as persuasion through what people see, with attention to arrangement, layering and colors. It can also be understood through three rhetorical appeals: logos, pathos and ethos. Logos as logic and clarity, pathos as emotion and atmosphere, and ethos as trust and credibility.
For IKEA, this theory is useful because the brand communicates through a whole visual system and not only through text. Its objects, interiors, website, store environment and customer experience all help shape the idea of accessible and manageable home design.
Analysis
Theory of Planned Behavior helps explain how IKEA turns the desire for a better home into a realistic action.
The brand forms a positive attitude by showing that home improvement can be pleasant, affordable and not scary. Bright objects, cozy room displays, colorful textiles, tableware, lighting and food make the customer feel that change does not have to start with a large expensive project. It can begin with one cushion, one lamp, one storage box or one chair.
Living room interior, IKEA Malaysia, 2026
IKEA Style Guide 2024. Living room interiors with blue, terracotta and natural wood accents.
