Catalogue
IKEA publishes an annual catalogue, first published in Swedish in 1951. IKEA published 197 million catalogues in 2010, in twenty languages and sixty-one editions. It is considered to be the main marketing tool of the retail giant, consuming 70% of the company's annual marketing budget.
The catalogue is distributed both in stores and by mail, with most of it being produced by IKEA Communications AB in IKEA's hometown of Älmhult, Sweden where IKEA operates the largest photo studio in northern Europe at 8,000 square metres. The catalogue itself is printed on chlorine-free paper of 10–15% post-consumer waste, and prints approximately 175 million copies worldwide annually, more than 3 times as much as the Bible.
According to Canadian broadcaster, CTV, "IKEA's publications have developed an almost cult-like following online. Readers have found all kinds of strange tidbits, including mysterious cat pictures, apparent Mickey Mouse references and weird books wedged into the many shelves that clutter the catalogues."
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Famous quotes containing the word catalogue:
“The catalogue of forms is endless: until every shape has found its city, new cities will continue to be born. When the forms exhaust their variety and come apart, the end of cities begins.”
—Italo Calvino (1923–1985)
“To a person uninstructed in natural history, his country or sea-side stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with wonderful works of art, nine-tenths of which have their faces turned to the wall. Teach him something of natural history, and you place in his hands a catalogue of those which are worth turning round.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“Ay, in the catalogue ye go for men,
As hounds and greyhounds, mongrels, spaniels, curs,
Shoughs, water-rugs, and demi-wolves, are clept
All by the name of dogs.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)