Brief - The Hustle

Digits: Ikea’s latest magic trick, and more newsy numbers

Written by Jacob Cohen | May 1, 2023 9:48:15 PM

1) Since it wasn’t already cool enough that Ikea sells 1B+ meatballs a year, the company is now working magic with cost cuts. In one instance, new designs for the Billy bookcase — which sells 6.3m units a year, or one every five seconds — reduced its price 29%. Another redesign, for the Flintan chair, enables Ikea to fit 6.9k units into one shipping container, up from 2.75k.

2) Listen up, kids. The next time an adult asks you what you want to be when you grow up, tell them you want to open a brick-and-mortar confectionery operation that leverages the latest algorithmic recommendation tech. In other words, you want to open a candy store — of which there are 3.3k in the US — and market your goods on TikTok. One shop, Candy Me Up, has 1.1m+ followers, and a single video can stir up 10k orders.

3) Look, we get it. Bamboo looks nice. And it’s sustainable. But you can’t just freely use it in your marketing for products made of semisynthetic rayon, which appears to be a popular new trend among retailers. Well, you could, but you may end up like Kohl’s and Walmart, who the FTC fined $2.5m and $3m, respectively, last year for trying to, uh, bamboozle customers with their so-called “bamboo” sheets, towels, and rugs.

4) This AI stuff is really making a case for itself: Legal AI startup Harvey recently raised $21m in funding to help lawyers make their billable hours a byte more efficient. The company reportedly already has 15k+ law firms on its waitlist, and will be used by thousands of lawyers at prestigious firms like Allen & Overy and PwC.