IKEA BUS 7- Klippan vs. Predator

How much do I really need to say about this? I think it’s clear that you need to ride the IKEA Bus this year, or Predator will win. Do you want the earth to be overrun with Predators? I’m pretty sure you don’t.

So, starting TOMORROW, 4/1, at NOON, head on over to the Eventbrite page and buy yourself some tickets to this year’s bus.

I threaten every year to pull the plug on IKEA Bus because it’s time consuming and generates no profit. However, I love you guys so much and I can’t bear to leave you hangin’ when I know you all need  to reupholster everything in your home with trippy mushroom fabric. I am also recently cohabiting with a very nice boy who owns a lot of books, so we have some serious storage needs right now (plus, if you ride the bus, you’ll get to meet him). Consider this year is a 50/50 selfish/not-selfish split. Either way, we’re going, it’s happening, and you should get all up in it (because last year actually sold out pretty fast). Your meatballs are waiting.

BUY TICKETS HERE
(starting at noon, on 4/1/17- no foolin)

IKEA BUS 6- The Undiscovered KLÄNGLILJA

Yeah, it’s a Star Trek VI joke.

Ok, so I pay like $32 a year for my domain name and all it’s good for is this. Will I ever write anything else? Maybe. Does it even matter? NO! Because…

IKEA BUS 6 IS ACTUALLY HAPPENING!

I know I’ve been talking about it casually for weeks, and that I keep promising that I’ll put the ticket site up “tomorrow.” I know that I’m a damn dirty liar. I’m sorry, being a responsible adult is not my strong suit. But, I’ve finally pulled it together this weekend and got that ticket site up. It’s GO TIME:

ikeabus6.eventbrite.com

Nothing is new and different, because the original formula just works so damn well. Even the prices ($35 for early birds, and $40 for everyone else) are still the same. Don’t make me spell it all out here, just get to the ticket site and do your thing. Or, hit that envelope up in the right hand corner and ask me all about it.

Please come. I don’t get out much anymore.

 

IKEA BUS 5 Anyone?

Yeah, It’s been such a long time since I updated this site (I know, I’m the worst), that I totally forgot to post about the IKEA Bus! Well, it’s happening again, and there are still tickets available.

GET THEM HERE:

(also, all the useful information you could ever want about riding the bus.

ikeabus5.eventbrite.com

Or, click on the fancy IKEA graphic to the right or whatever.

Come with us and eat many of these $.50 hot dogs! Buy a patio pear! Hell, buy 100. They’ll all fit on the truck!

Anyway, I’m pretty lazy right now, so hit me up if you need more info. This could very well be the last IKEA Bus ever, so you’re probably going to want to be on it.

NO FOOLIN. (it’s IKEAbus time!)

It’s springtime bitches, and you know what that means… IKEA BUS! Yes, we’re (and by we I mean me) doing it again, and no April Foolin, tickets are on sale today. I’m doing a limited amount of $30 early bird tickets, so if you’re definitely in, you might want to get on that soon. (BE AN EARLY BIRD RIGHT NOW)

For those of you who don’t know about the many mystical properties of the IKEA Bus, here is a brief lowdown:

For less than a price of a bus ticket to Boston, you get a ride to a place that the Greyhound won’t take you, donuts & coffee, a bunch of local snacks, and trashy in-flight movies. Oh, and did I mention the liberal BYOB policy?

Did I also mention that we have an awesome moving company who will bring all your giant boxes back to Portland for you and deliver them to your car or house? (Deliveries to towns other than Portland are currently in negotiation.)

p.s. IKEA is a amazing. Jonathan Coulton will tell you all about it.

If you want all the actual factual details about the logistics of the trip, you can find it all on the ticketing site. But really, you don’t need to know those details.  All you need to know is that there’s pretty much nothing better than slightly tipsy furniture shopping with a lot of excellent people. Also, meatballs.

death of a salesman.

let’s be clear: i am a terrible sales person.

when i was in 2nd grade, i quit girl scouts because i didn’t like being forced to sell cookies. in 5th grade, i quit trick or treating because it felt too much like solicitation. despite the fact that everyone loves girl scout cookies, and virtually every person in america has a bowl of candy at the ready on halloween, i couldn’t shake the dirtiness of asking someone to give me something- or worse, BUY SOMETHING!

it’s kind of my worst non-dismemberment related fear. like twitchy cold sweat vomit grade fear.

so here we are at IKEA bus time again, and we have 27 people signed up for a bus that holds 50. and on the inside, i’m all like OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT. but then again, i don’t actually want to ask anyone to to buy a ticket. or flood my facebook and twitter feeds with plugs for my little project. so i’m sort of at a stalemate.

so my decision was to try and overcome my fear in the least invasive and annoying way i could think of- a short and to the point blog post. just one more before i give up, pat myself on the back, and say “hey, 27 people is still pretty sweet. you’re gonna have a kick ass time”.

so here it is.

IKEA BUS- come and get it!

good morning early birds! just in case you missed the first announcement, the IKEA BUS is back in action! tickets go on sale today, and because it’s late and i’m punchy, this year’s event is called: Revenge of the IKEA Bus (the Squeakquel)! The magic date is SATURDAY, MAY 19th, but otherwise the rules are pretty much the same as last year: donuts, bus, snacks, movie, ikea, frolicking, bus, movie, delivery, allen wrenches, bourbon.

this year, because i like to mix things up a little, i’m giving last year’s price of $30 a ticket for 1 WEEK ONLY. if you buy a ticket after 4/24, you’ll have to pay an extra $5. i have some ideas for snacks and in-flight movies, but i definitely need to get some more suggestions going on. i’m also hoping to work out a truck situation with some sexy local movers, but i haven’t nailed that one down quite yet. either way, there will be a truck (so now is your chance to buy a couch!) and free donuts. and fun. you don’t want to miss out on the fun. so get your ticket going RIGHT NOW, and start making your wish list.

IKEA BUS-save the date!

i’m hoping to get ticket sales up and running next week while i’m recuperating, but in the meantime… i have rented a bus. if you want to ride the ikea bus 2.0, you might want to put the date MAY 19TH on your calendars. but now, i must rest (it’s 2 am and tomorrow is surgery day).

back to school.

well, i’ve been a lazy sack this summer, and it was AWESOME. i actually read some trashy books, went to the beach, ate ice cream cones, got a terrible sunburn, did some flea marketing… all the best summer cliches, TO THE MAX.

although now that things are cooling down, i’m digging out my sweaters, dreaming of the pumpkin harvest and watching all the kiddos are getting shoveled back into their classrooms (as if that affects me in any way other than the bountiful reaping of cheap composition notebooks). and, i’m feeling ready to get back down to business.

so as of this morning, summer hours are officially closed.

what does this mean for you?

well, it means:

1. more posting! ok, not like that time that i lied to you and told you that i was going to post every day (i’m such a scumbag!)… but definitely more than once a week.

2. new features! i had a brilliant idea for a a new fashion feature, along with some recipes and some other awesome shit. possibly. possibly some other awesome shit.

3. old feautres! hey, whatever happened to the weekend pickthrough? or what about that time i tried to start a “store spotlight” section? and although increasingly this blog has moved away from the coupon factor (best left to maine’s own extreme couponer, i love to gossip), i would like to bring it back some deal hunting in smaller more subtle ways.

4. special events! one of my favorite things about the past year was my chance to be involved in some crazy projects. well, i’m definitely planning on keeping that shit rolling now that i’m done being lazy. there’s another SWAPmaine scheduled for october (we’re still working on the dates & location, but picture BIGGER & BETTER!), another IKEAbus planned for the spring, as well as the revival of the makeup project, and possibly a mystery event/appearance or two.  would anyone be into a cheap beer pub crawl/meetup (perhaps a joint venture with deal me in portland)?

anyway, thank you for weathering the low keyness that was my summer posting schedule. it was much needed, but i’m ready to reanimate. let me know if there’s anything new you’d like to see/old you’d like to see revived/thing you’d love to see more of/thing you never want to see again. or, you can just tell me what you did with your summer vacation.

i should go, because i’m going to be late for work. BUT, i’ll be back tomorrow with a small announcement about a “celebrity” appearance i’ll be making in september.

ALL SYSTEMS GO!

on monday when i only had 13 tickets sold and no sign of picking up… i was ready to quit this bitch. i really didn’t think it was gonna happen. i even started making other plans for the 23rd.

i don’t know if it was my general sad sackness working the guilt angle, or just that people woke up and realized that they really did need to buy 25 billy book cases in order for their lives to feel complete… but i hit my half way goal and then a little bit more  yesterday.

as of this morning, i’m at 27 seats sold, and i’m sending the bus company my money- eek!  what i’m trying to say is that the IKEA bus is ON. ON. ON.

there are still 23 tickets left that i’m gonna be trying really hard to sell (anybody got any catchy poster ideas?), but the die is cast. i’m going through with it no matter what. i am also taking recommendations for what should go in my local food snack packs.

finally, i want to say THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU to everyone who talked about, facebook liked, and tweeted up this event. many of you couldn’t afford it or had other plans, but you still cheered me on. gennyfer shook down the moms over at raising maine! cindy and matt guilt tripped their coworkers! the entirety of the forge brandsstaff decided to drink the ikea bus kool aid!

anyway, thank you. i am overwhelmed! i make you my solemn promise that the ikea bus will be as awesome as i can possibly make it. and for those of you who can’t join us, i promise frequent twitter updates and lots of goofy pictures of people pretending to poop in the fake ikea display bathrooms.

the edge of extinction.

ok folks, it’s time for us to have a serious sit down discussion about the ikea bus.

the first week of ticket sales was exciting. after the first few days, i had 13 people already and it seemed like things were all systems go.

and then, they stopped going.

i  was stuck at 13 tickets for almost an entire week. and the worst part was that people kept asking me how it was going…

i’m a firm believer that it’s never good for business to tell people that things aren’t going well. so i would say things like “it’s going, but i wanna sell that shit out!” or “it’s coming along, but there’s still room!”. it’s a little awkward. and i’ve been feeling a lot of shame about the fact that it’s not going better. both because i don’t like failing at things, and because i really really do want it to happen.

i sold a few more tickets last week, but just a few. and sadly, my attempts at getting some press coverage turned out to be completely balls. so here i am, stalled out at at 16 tickets (i made the boyfriend promise to buy one, so i could say  17 and not totally be lying).

i’m not sure what happened. 58 people liked my press release on facebook. the eventbrite page has almost 600 page views! and everyone and their grandma keeps telling me what an awesome idea it is. so what gives?

bad timing? no money? not the right time to buy a couch after all? i have no idea.

the truth is that i’m scared. if i can’t get up to at least 25 (preferably 30) by the 7th (that’s THIS THURSDAY), i’m gonna have to cancel. the problem is that the money is mine, and if i don’t get the bus filled , that money still disappears. and i have student loans and a mortgage that can’t let that happen.

i don’t want to beg you. begging isn’t classy. more than anything, i’d like to gently remind you to buy your ticket now if you’re planning on going- or at least send me an email telling me that you’re definitely coming. and i’d also like to warn all the fabulous folks that did buy tickets, that there is currently a high likelihood that the trip will be canceled. so, spread the world to your friends and neighbors if you want it to be on. and if anyone knows a media outlet that might give the ikea bus a little lovin… now is the time to call in some favors!