There’s a very cool BW article on Ikea today that’s worth a look. From the article:

This cost obsession fuses with the design culture. “Designing beautiful-but-expensive products is easy,” says Josephine Rydberg-Dumont, president of Ikea of Sweden. “Designing beautiful products that are inexpensive and functional is a huge challenge.”

No design — no matter how inspired — finds its way into the showroom if it cannot be made affordable. To achieve that goal, the company’s 12 full-time designers at Almhult, Sweden, along with 80 freelancers, work hand in hand with in-house production teams to identify the appropriate materials and least costly suppliers, a trial-and-error process that can take as long as three years.

Tyler Durden may be rebelling, but clearly the world at large isn’t. But a company like Ikea does raise a lot of interesting questions about design and business; individuality and comformity.