IKEA Introduces Home Design AI Assistant in ChatGPT Store

IKEA has unveiled a generative AI chatbot powered by ChatGPT to help its customers design their homes quickly. Parag Parekh, Chief Digital Officer at IKEA Retail (Ingka Group), told Forbes in an interview that the AI assistant is an easy-to-use alternative to IKEA store visits, which can often be overwhelming.

This is not the first time the global furniture giant has leveraged AI to improve customer experience. It introduced Ikea Kreativ in 2022, a virtual home design app that lets customers visualize and design their living spaces in a mixed-reality environment.

With this new AI deployment, IKEA is setting new standards in home interior designs, making its work easier, and retaining its dominance as a leading player in the home furniture market. Parag Parekh revealed in the Forbes interview that the new generative AI chatbot is currently available to ChatGPT Plus users in the United States and is intended for use alongside IKEA Kreativ.

The chatbot can answer questions about products and purchases and make personalized design suggestions to customers. “If I take a traditional user journey pre the AI era – typically it would be visiting our website … you decide what you really want in your home, and then you put it into the basket, come to our stores to check that out, then you complete the purchase and have it delivered to your home,” Parekh explains.

“Now, come AI … maybe the customer journey is different. You probably aren’t looking at single pieces of furniture, but you’re looking at furnishing your home, bringing that to life. We allow you to actually take a scan of your room and give you an experience of what that furniture would look like,” he added.

Parekh further explains that customers can also interact with the AI to get more ideas about style, color schemes, lighting, and budget. The chatbot functions like a professional interior decorator sitting with the customer, helping them create what they want. It can also erase old furniture and replace it with new items to give users an idea of the final look and feel of their spaces.

But, Some Still Prefer Using IKEA’s Web Catalog

Francesco Marzoni, chief data and analytics officer at Ingka Group, said that he still prefers using the catalogs on the IKEA site, as the GPT assistant “was not a good partner in interior design”, The Verge reported. The Ingka Group operates 379 IKEA stores and 103 IKEA shops in 31 countries.

“I started with the prompt, ‘I need storage ideas for my small living room/bedroom.’ However, instead of showing me some ideas, the Ikea GPT told me to check an article on the IKEA US website and added a photo of a living room for good measure”, says Marzoni.

Marzoni goes on to explain a few more prompts he used that all brought him to essentially the same thing: a list of websites or products linked to a product information page. This “defeated the purpose of having an AI assistant at my fingertips,” he says.

While the tool may not be perfect according to Marzoni’s experience, Parekh explained that a lot of experimentation is still being done, and the IKEA AI assistant will be deployed to other territories outside the US when it’s time.