Thousands sign up for Ikea hide-and-seek; Ikea not pleased

More than 18 thousand people have signed up to play hide-and-seek in the IKEA store in Eindhoven on May 16th, according to the Facebook page "Versoppertje in de Ikea Eindhoven". This seemed to worry the store, who put a stop to the event. Similar events have been created on Facebook for locations all across the Netherlands. The second most popular hide and seek game seems to be at the IKEA store in Breda, with more than 1,400 people indicating that they will be attending. Events in Amsterdam, Heerlen and Utrecht have had a less enthusiastic response with 577, 161 and 36 attendees respectively. The massive amount of interest in Eindhoven has IKEA worried. "We know about it, but this is not the intent" an IKEA employee told the AD. "Our stores are designed to provide customers with a safe and pleasant shopping experience. Playing hide-and-seek does not belong here." The initiators of the event backed off after IKEA's response. "Unfortunately IKEA is not willing to cooperate, which we deeply regret. But all your enthusiastic responses have driven us to find another location", they said on the Facebook page for the event. Ikea allowed a similar event last year in Belgium, at the request of Elise de Rijk just before her 30th birthday. "The action in Belgium was a n once off thing", a spokesperson for IKEA Netherlands said.