The Swedish furniture giant IKEA is in a bit of a trouble in Norway. IKEA had bought sponsored links for “Stressless”, which is a registered trademark for sofas and armchairs owned by the competitor Ekornes. On a search for Stressless on Google, a link to IKEA came up on top, which of course upset Ekornes. IKEA pulled the ads and apologised to the competitor.
When the Norwegian news site E24 asks the Communications Manager of IKEA Norway if they had bought links to other brands owned by competitors, he hasn’t got the facts straight and handles the crisis situation very poorly.
– No, I am not aware of any, he says. But E24 does a few searches and finds that IKEA has also bought links for “Tripp Trapp”, a brand owned by Stokke.
Now, do you know if someone is mooching off your brand?
[Via Börje.]