{"id":303,"date":"2009-12-14T07:36:05","date_gmt":"2009-12-14T11:36:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/?p=303"},"modified":"2009-12-14T07:36:05","modified_gmt":"2009-12-14T11:36:05","slug":"gekas-the-temple-of-freezer-bags-and-socks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/gekas-the-temple-of-freezer-bags-and-socks\/","title":{"rendered":"Gek\u00e5s – the temple of freezer bags and socks"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>Imagine Sweden on a beautiful day in July. Imagine the warm\u00a0breeze, the\u00a0fresh air,\u00a0the\u00a0wide fields, the\u00a0endless coastlines and the great big smorgasbord of things to do, see and experience. What would you pick? Would you spend the day on the beach? Take a boattrip in the archipelago (sk\u00e4rg\u00e5rd<\/strong>)? A walk in the woods? A stroll around\u00a0a little fishing village?<\/p>\n

Well, let me tell you what the first choice would be for thousands of Swedes. They\u00a0 (I…) would get in\u00a0a steaming hot\u00a0car and travel hundreds of kilometers, to the little town of Ullared in the south west of Sweden. Ullared has 830 inhabitants, a firestation, a hotel and a primary school. But (you can see the “but” coming, can’t you?) Ullared also has Gek\u00e5s, Scandinavia’s biggest department store (varuhus<\/strong>)\u00a0and one of Sweden’s most popular tourist attractions.<\/p>\n

Over 20 000 people enter the doors of Gek\u00e5s every day and on a good day, they (we…) spend \u00f6ver 20 million SEK in there!\u00a0(1.6 million\u00a0GBP, 2.9 millon USD – roughly). It might not sound like an\u00a0overwhelming sum of money at first, but when you take a closer look at what Gek\u00e5s mostly sells and think about the number of Swedes, it is pretty respectable.
\nGek\u00e5s\u00a0is\u00a0four football pitches big\u00a0and packed to the limit with\u00a0freezer bags (frysp\u00e5sar<\/strong>), socks, washing up liquid, shampoo, cotton\u00a0balls, underwear, sweets, toys… you name it, Gek\u00e5s has it and it’s cheap (billigt<\/strong>). You can even stay the night or a fortnight in the Gek\u00e5s campsite or the Gek\u00e5s motel in case you plan to shop until you drop.<\/p>\n

But Gek\u00e5s is much more than an\u00a0house filled with bargains.\u00a0Since founded in 1963, Gek\u00e5s has become an insitution that you either love or hate – even if you haven’t been – and everyone has\u00a0something to say about it.\u00a0The stories about\u00a0the department store\u00a0are many and amazing (people almost dying of exhaustion in the\u00a0long queues, people fistfighting\u00a0over\u00a0a parking space…)\u00a0and this winter, Gek\u00e5s got its own tv-program. One of Sweden’s most popular tv-channels spent the whole summer filming customers (kunder<\/strong>) and sales assistants and believe it or not, it became one of the most\u00a0popular tv-shows this year. Ullared part II is already scheduled for next year and “Gek\u00e5s the Christmas special” is on tonight. If you are lucky, you can win a pack of freezer bags signed by the boss of Gek\u00e5s. And that is not a joke<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So forget Stockholm, nevermind the north and don’t bother with the coastline. If you want to experience the true Swedish soul and get yourself a trolly filled with bargains at the same time – Ullared is the place to be. Just remember to bring comfortable shoes and very sharp elbows.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Foto:Daniel J\u00e4lmbratt\/Kanal 5<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Gek\u00e5s in numbers:<\/span><\/strong>
\nEvery year, the customers buy 100 million paper cups, 12 million rolls of baking paper, 1 million schampoo bottles, 12 million pair of socks and 2 000 tons of sweets.<\/span><\/span>
\nThe average customer drive 150 kilometer to get to Ullared.
\nGek\u00e5s has Sweden’s biggest parking lot with 2 000 parking spaces.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Have you been to Ullared? Or would you rather eat someone’s dirty socks? Share your thoughts or experience and you might win a pack of freezer bags signed by the Swedish blog team!<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"\"

Imagine Sweden on a beautiful day in July. Imagine the warm\u00a0breeze, the\u00a0fresh air,\u00a0the\u00a0wide fields, the\u00a0endless coastlines and the great big smorgasbord of things to do, see and experience. What would you pick? Would you spend the day on the beach? Take a boattrip in the archipelago (sk\u00e4rg\u00e5rd)? A walk in the woods? A stroll around\u00a0a…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":304,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[3203,136,159,3493],"class_list":["post-303","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-gekas","tag-shopping","tag-tourism","tag-ullared"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/304"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/swedish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}