IKEA is one of the few retailers that draws customers from a multistate region to its stores. Natalie Wold, who is building a home in Herriman, says she makes annual trips from Utah to California to shop at IKEA's Los Angeles-area stores and has spread her love of IKEA to several friends in Utah County, who now also make regular pilgrimages to its California stores.

"I love it," Wold said. "They have a lot of solutions for small spaces and storage. I like their clean lines and modern look. When I moved here (from England), I found that so many things look the same. So I love their bright colors, I love their floating shelves and their storage containers. In my last house — we're building a new one now — but in my last house, you could go into a room and just know that it was an IKEA room.

"And it's so inexpensive," Wold said. "You can buy really cool-looking things for Wal-Mart prices. I do wonder how it will affect other furniture stores, though. You'll have a choice, you know, and their prices are so low. I wonder how others will compete."

Still, Wold said she will be an enthusiastic IKEA customer — and possibly more — when its doors open next year.

"I think I'll go there all the time. I'll probably get a job there, to be honest," Wold said, citing the company's employee discounts and benefits program (which extends to 20-hour-per-week workers as well as full-time employees).

IKEA currently operates 230 stores in 33 countries, including 27 in the United States. In addition to the Draper location, other recently announced stores include Brooklyn, N.Y.; Sunrise, Fla.; and Round Rock, Texas. The company was founded in 1943 by Ingvar Kamprad.

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