Furniture giant IKEA is testing a novel campaign in the United Arab Emirates, employing gamification and a miniature NFC-enabled smartphone bed to encourage customers to curb screen time before sleep.
The initiative, dubbed “Phone Sleep Collection,” offers discount vouchers to users who log seven consecutive nights of seven hours of sleep without touching their phones. This approach marks a strategic pivot for IKEA, moving beyond traditional furniture sales to address pressing societal issues like digital wellness and social disruption caused by screen addiction.
The miniature beds, modeled after IKEA’s full-sized offerings, utilize Near Field Communication (NFC) technology. Users simply place their smartphone on the bed and tap it to activate a sleep tracking function within the IKEA app. NFC allows two devices to communicate wirelessly over very short distances, typically less than 4 centimeters. For this campaign, it enables the app to silently monitor sleep duration undisturbed by phone interaction.
IKEA’s campaign slogan, “Stop scrolling. Start earning,” encapsulates the reward-based system designed to motivate behavioral change. The program aims to combat the prevalent issue of excessive nighttime phone use, which has been linked to mental health and sleep quality problems in the digital age.
Currently, the “Phone Sleep Collection” is a limited promotional item. It is available exclusively in the UAE for customers who make qualifying purchases from IKEA’s “Complete Sleep Collection.”
Despite its regional limitation, the campaign has garnered significant global attention and awareness. This widespread interest signals a potential for IKEA to expand the “mobile bed” promotion and its gamified marketing strategies to other countries. The move suggests a broader industry trend where major brands might increasingly focus on solutions for social disruption and digital well-being, alongside existing commitments to sustainability.