Idea Service — Browser Plugin to Order from IKEA

The Problem

2015. IKEA in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kazan. But not in Surgut, Nizhnevartovsk, and other wealthy northern cities. IKEA didn’t deliver outside its regions. The beautiful catalog was useless: look, but can’t buy.

A transport company saw an opportunity: we run routes between cities — why not ship IKEA? But we needed a way to turn the catalog into an actual shop.

Context of the Era

2015: browser extensions boom; IKEA rapidly expanding in Russia but logistics not nationwide. Northern cities had money but limited supply. Logistics firms searched for new niches.

Business Insights

• Geographic arbitrage: Demand (wealthy northern cities) + supply (IKEA) + no delivery = opportunity for logistics.
• Reverse engineering as an edge: Using internal IKEA endpoints gave stock/warehouse data to speed up order assembly.
• CRM reduces friction: Logistics = paperwork. Automation increased turnover and reduced errors.

How It Worked

Browser Extension

Users installed a Chrome extension. On IKEA’s site, they saw “Order with delivery.” The extension:

• Intercepted product interactions
• Added “Add to Idea Service cart” buttons
• Collected the basket and submitted a request into CRM

Under the hood: JavaScript Chrome extension + Django backend, lxml parsing when markup changed.

Reverse Engineering IKEA API

No public API. We studied the site’s requests and found internal endpoints for:

• Stock checks: where an item sits and how many
• Product info: prices, sizes, SKUs
• Logistics: which warehouses provide fastest pickup

This enabled:

• Automatic availability checks before submitting orders
• Faster truck assembly (we knew where to pick items)
• Avoiding “no stock, refund later” cases

CRM and Operations

• Django CRM for requests, batching, routing, docs.
• Statuses, notifications, delivery windows, payments.
• Accounting and export “as they like it.”

Results and Lessons

• Real demand, clear value, logistics‑first execution.
• Reverse engineering gave speed, CRM gave control.
• In logistics, automation is ROI — not a nice‑to‑have.