Question from Sou Belaidi
Hi Debra,
I came across your article regarding Ikea, today I am facing a wall with Ikea.
I am about my first store in London, I am a small business so i wanted to get some shelving unit from Ikea, the KALLAX series but I need to provide to the landlord the fire rating of the shelving units.
I have been calling customer service in Sweden and in the UK and no luck no one seems to know what is the fire rating of these shelves.
Without this information, I will not be able to open my store.
Do you think you can help?
Debra’s Answer
I think I know why IKEA can’t give you an answer.
It’s two things.
First, they probably don’t understand what you are asking for. Do you understand what this term means?
A fire rating refers to the length of time that a material can withstand complete combustion during a a standard fire test.
In the USA, Fire testing of building materials and components of buildings — such as joists, beams and fire walls — is required in mostplaces by local building codes (though I personally have never run into this). Fire tests for consumer products—such as appliances and furniture—are, for the most part, voluntary. Except for certain products such as children’s sleepwear, mattresses and sofas.
In the UK the national building regulations contain fire classifications for building productsYour landlord is probably referring to these.
Why does Ikea not know the fire rating of their shelving?
It may be that there is no fire rating for shelving.
It may be that they are an international company and don’t know the local regulations.
If it were me, I would go back to my landlord, find out exactly what he or she needs, and then go back to Ikea with an exact request rather than a general request. Tell them this is national building regulations in the UK.
One thing I don’t understand is why shelving would need a fire rating? Perhaps your landlord is asking for something that isn’t necessary.
I know this answer seems a bit off topic for this blog, but I wanted to look it up to see if there was a connection between fire ratings and chemical fire retardants. I don’t know the answer to that without a lot more research, but here in the USA flammability laws require sofas and mattresses, for example, to meet fire ratings, and therefore often toxic fire retardants are used. Don’t know about this in the UK.
