You keep forgetting that, but Markus Söder basically spends his entire political life in the opposition. And in doing so, even though he has grown to be the size of a goliath, he acts as a cunning David who takes on every seemingly more powerful opponent. Be it your own candidate for chancellor, the sister party, the phalanx of the other prime ministers or changing federal governments. When Söder was not yet Upper Bavarian, he brought his Frankism into opposition to everything that was Upper Bavarian and Munich. And has wrested a Franconian “crime scene” from the Bavarian Broadcasting Corporation. The man just has his patriotic pride.
In this respect, one does not even want to imagine what would happen if there were a German furniture and furnishings chain with monopoly-like market power that would plagiarize the Ikea principle and name all its products after local lakes and rivers, landscapes and localities. In individual cases, this may be charming and even cast a bit of shine on the namesake. Because you might be inclined, for example, to project the cozy feeling that comes with lounging around on the cozy “Schweinfurt” sofa landscape onto the city, which is not particularly well-reputed. But a wobbly “Steigerwald” cellar shelf, even a disdainful “Nürnberg” cucumber slicer or, the culmination of all character assassination campaigns, a “Pegnitz” toilet brush? And woe betide the “Isar” bedroom cupboard looking more elegant than the “Main” model. But then there would be a fire on the roof, someone knows Söder. The Franconian already feels that he has been set back if no Bavarian social democrat becomes federal minister. So many “Bamberg” buckets couldn’t be filled with water to put out this fire again.
In Sweden people seem to be much more relaxed about that. Even if people, locals and non-residents alike, first think of trash cans, towel racks or block candles when they hear about Toftan, Voxnan or Hemsjö, these names are at least familiar to them from various shopping trips at Ikea. So the most important hurdle in tourism marketing has already been overcome. If, as a resident of Lökna, for example, a village on the banks of the Bolmen, you put your humiliation behind you and maybe even have two sparks of self-irony, then you pack resolutely for the toilet brush to stay in the picture. So takes the template from the furniture store and explains to people that Bolmen is also a toilet brush, but not only. This is what it says on a poster on the banks of the Bolmen, which is a pretty lake south of the Store Mosse National Park with several islands.
There are many lakes in Sweden, including some that are beautiful and have islands. But it is the Bolmen that is now at the center of an advertising campaign by the state tourism agency Visit Sweden. The lake won’t care if it is mistaken for a toilet brush. The neighbors could get annoyed about it if they were stupid. Because they are obviously not, they seize the business-minded opportunity that presents itself to them. It will be your lake that will attract holidaymakers in the future. Anyone who spends their holidays at Bolmen has a story to tell that is not, like everyone else, about the many mosquitos and moose in the front yard. It’s about something that only insiders who can be influenced by advertising know, who leave their cozy Ikea interiors and return to their origins.
The Ikea people have a strange sense of humor
If you don’t want to wait until summer, you can get up from the Järvfjället swivel chair and travel to the mountain of the same name in Swedish Lapland. Or, at a similar north latitude, to the village of Kallax. Wonderful winter wonderlands can be found there. The longer you scroll through the Visit Sweden campaign, the more astonishing is the weird humor of the Ikea people. The village of Kallax is no more associated with a clunky shelving system than the fishing village of Skärhamn with a door handle. And Lake Bolmen is anything but Sweden’s sewer.
Anyone who disapproves of the argument that the 21 selected travel destinations have already become prominent without any action on their part by means of furniture catalogs in the millions and have now also received an extra dose of attention from the Swedish tourism authority, should be told that the campaign is only fair. Because the places all have the same problem: They are extremely difficult to find. Anyone looking for them on the Internet always ends up in the online shop of a furniture and furnishings store.