IKEA is opening an on-line store and we're all going to live longer.

IKEA has finally made the decision to rectify our stress levels. IKEA Australia is trialling (yes, we’re one of the first in the world) an on-line store.

This is a game changer. It’s like the invention of Paywave, the iPhone, chicken salt, when they got rid of money in monopoly and replaced it with a credit card and stick on earrings.

The ability to shop online at Ikea is good for our houses. It’s a plus for our lifestyle goals. But, most importantly, it’s a win for longevity and clear skin.

There is a direct correlation between visiting IKEA and rising stress levels. Stress is bad for longevity people, it’s science. It not only shortens your lifespan it causes stress pimples. Again science or someone told me that in Year 10 which is kind of the same.

Even hearing the word is stressful. It whispers opportunity and SCREAMS commitment. Yes, that lamp, that couch, those cushions, or the trendy glass Tupperware containers that are healthy AND durable… all those things are opportunities for an easier, more space-efficient, more stylish life. But do they justify the utter commitment it takes to attain them?

That, right there, is the catch.

There’s the travel time. The car parking spot. The maze (that tells you which way you are allowed to walk). The engineer’s pencils. Did we mention being told which way to walk? And, when you think you’re done, you hit the concreted loading area, where you slip a disc in your back and play hide-and-seek with all the items you’ve listed on your fancy paper, while trying not to run anyone over with your uncooperative trolley.

All the while you have a running budget in your head – accounting for all those extra items that have latched to you like magnets (without you realising, of course) and you’re trying to think of everything you might possibly need, because you don’t want to have to put yourself through this ordeal again any time soon. That’s when you see the meatballs for $2.99. Who wants meatballs with a trolley full of furniture? It’s a Swedish store. Surely vodka should be on the menu?

Then your outside. You have to work out how everything is going to fit in the car. You pack and repack and share exhausted, knowing glances with strangers walking into IKEA who are really saying, “See this strange man next to me with the too high pants? His an engineer from Melbourne University I’ve hired for the day so I can negate entirely the problem you are currently experiencing.”

You end up driving home with a Billy Bookcase about to slam into the back of your skull at any moment and you can hear, one by one, four of the set of eight dinner plates smash into pieces.

But it’s STILL not over. Once you’ve finally escaped the suburb-sized monstrosity that is IKEA, you still have to make the goddamn piece of furniture yourself.

(Also, don’t even think about venturing into IKEA with your significant other, it’s not going to end well):

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See what I mean about stress levels?

Thankfully, IKEA is concerned about our life spans, complexion and greying hair, and that, I’m sure, is what’s lead them to start this initiative.

By the end of 2016, IKEA on-line will be up and running in Australia. And it should launch globally within the next two years.

The homewares powerhouse will start testing different models for this on-line operation over the next six months. Concepts include small-format IKEA stores (which will be around one-tenth of the size of IKEA flagship stores), branded pick-up points, unbranded pick-up points and third-party depots.

We can now rest-easy, my ever-ageing, slightly-neurotic, bare-apartment-dwelling friends.

No longer do we need to spend endless nights awake in bed weighing up the opportunities and commitments of those coat hangers, throw rugs and nifty storage units that can hang from the ceiling for space saving purposes.

Even though it will still be our responsibility to build the furniture after ordering it (or we could just get Ryan Reynolds to do it)…

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… This task seems unbelievably more achievable without the marathon that traditionally comes before it.

You never know, it might even be fun – IKEA, after all, is ticking all our health boxes with their fancy engineer’s pencils.

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