Transparency Makes the Difference

I've been lax on posting recently because I've been quite under the weather. Still am, but have to, like all parents, continue doing the parenting thing no matter how sick I am. One thing we are in the process of doing is transitioning my 22-month-old into a "big boy bed." As with our crib purchase, we enter the minefield of particleboard, formaldehyde, and other annoyingly omnipresent components in furniture. What makes these kinds of purchasing decisions much more difficult is that companies are rarely clear or up-front about what kind of materials are used in their products. (Take my Pottery Barn fiasco as an example).

I wanted to briefly spotlight one company whose transparency makes my job much easier. Ikea certainly stocks plenty of furniture items constructed with particleboard--hey, that's how it keeps its prices so low. But it also sells a lot of sustainable wood-only products. And determining one from the other is extremely simple: each Ikea furniture product contains its entire component material list on its tag or on the website. So, for example, we are looking at Ikea's selection of children's beds. Some of them include particleboard or fiberboard; some of them don't. I don't have to guess. And although the selection of non-particleboard furniture is not huge, it exists, which is more than a lot of large retailers can claim. I love that many of their products are completely particleboard free.

This rings true not just for children's beds, but also for TV consoles and other living room furniture. Once we've made a choice on the big boy bed, I'll post about it, but if you are in the same boat as me, consider shopping at Ikea and reading the tags.