As our plane was approaching Oslo, I was wondering how a night could feel so long, and yet be so short at the same time. We had left Newark, NJ, at around 8:00pm. I was unable to sleep much, but sat with my eyes closed for quite a while. When I opened them at midnight (EST) I was surprised to see that it was already getting light, and I didn’t sleep for the rest of the flight. The next week would be like that—lots of daylight and very little darkness. I was one of seven Stressless dealers from Florida-Georgia who would meet with other dealers from around the USA (fifty all together) for a tour of the Ekornes factory. We would see where these recliners are made, as well as share a sightseeing journey.
We took a train from the airport to Oslo and all vowed not to sleep until that night because we wanted to set our body clocks to Norwegian time. The first thing I did at the hotel was lie on the bed with my legs straight up the wall for about 20 minutes. They had swollen a bit during the long flight, and this had an amazing restorative effect—I could almost feel my legs “draining.” We met for lunch, sitting outside along a “walking street” (no cars allowed). We each had a hamburger or sandwich, a beer and a cup of coffee. The bill for the seven of us was $400! Norwegians tend to be slim and trim, and I had always thought that that was because of the cool weather, their active lifestyles, and especially their propensity for walking up and down mountains. Now I was starting to think that perhaps it’s partly because they can’t afford to eat!
Akershus Fortress, on Oslo Harbor
As we meandered around Oslo, two thoughts kept popping into my mind: First, this is a really beautiful place, and second, I wonder if it is humanly possible to fall asleep while walking. We explored a castle with an accompanying fortress armed with an impressive number of cannons, some of which had deep pock-marks surrounded by metal that had obviously been melted by return fire. After exploring the harbor, we had dinner at one of the many restaurants there. Then, I was finally able to satisfy my craving for sleep.
View from the glass restaurant in Alesund
The next morning’s flight was about forty minutes north to Ålesund, whose airport is actually on the island of Vigra (a name we were all able to remember). Our bus took us hundreds of feet under the sea only to emerge on another island. Another tunnel then spiraled us 360° down and around the island and under the sea again before bringing us to the mainland. All of this infrastructure for a city of 50,000 reminded me that, with its vast oil and natural reserves in the North Sea, Norway is a very wealthy country. Even with this seemingly modest population, Ålesund is the fifth largest city in Norway. Our bus carried us part way up a mountain to a basically all-glass restaurant overlooking the city. We had a most enjoyable lunch.
A short ride back into town ended at our hotel. Soon we headed to the Ekornes showroom, a beautiful four-story waterfront building that houses the biggest and best display of Stressless furniture in the world. Our tour of the building concluded on the top floor with a great Norwegian dinner in their dining room.
The next morning’s gentle rain seemed to be saying “welcome to Norway” (and we were similarly welcomed on several other legs of our journey). I kept reminding myself of the old Norwegian saying that there is no such thing as bad weather…only bad clothing. Our generous hosts had provided each of us with a nice hooded parka, no doubt aware that the possibility of a shower could not be ruled out. I stayed out on the deck of the boat for most of the ride re-affirming to myself “this is not bad weather…I have good clothing…this is not bad weather…”
Ekornes factory
Before the factory tour, we gathered for a presentation with our group of fifty plus senior Ekornes management. I’m not sure if I was “chosen” as one of the speakers because they considered me a shining example, or because I was one of the few who was willing to do it. Public speaking is not really my forte and there was a situation that was making it worse. I had been somewhat “irregular”, as happens sometimes when I travel, so earlier I had eaten a healthy dose of prunes. I don’t know if Norwegian prunes are more potent than the ones from America, or if I just ate too many of them, but I could certainly feel them having a dramatic effect. Then I made the mistake of letting the thought pop into my mind, “Well, what’s the worst thing that could happen?” You can only imagine my sense of relief when it was announced that there would be a short break before continuing with the presentations. I was not at all concerned as to whether or not anyone else in the room would notice the sense of urgency in my stride as I made a bee-line to the nearest restroom. When it came my time to speak, I was a little nervous, but totally confident that at least I wouldn’t explode.
I had been asked to speak about our local marketing efforts and I had a slide show that was put together by Colleen from our advertising agency, Quenzel and Associates. I had several people afterwards tell me that it was a good presentation and nobody said that they hated it. I was glad to have that behind me, and looked forward to the factory tour.
If you’ve never been in a well-run furniture factory, I can only tell you that it is a very impressive sight. This factory can produce 1,300 Stressless chairs a day—and does. Two shifts of people work eight hour days with the help of about 60 robots that work around the clock. If a robot has a problem, it calls an operator to come help. (The unemployment rate in this region of Norway is actually zero—anyone who can work can find a job). Adjectives that I would use to describe the factory would be clean, efficient, well-organized, environmentally friendly and employee-friendly. It seemed like a good place to work.
In my tour of the factory, as well as the tour of their showroom I was impressed by how everyone in the company is always thinking “how can we make it better?” Ekornes promotes itself as the “innovators of comfort” and this is not just a slogan or a marketing ploy—it is a core value of the company; it’s who they are. For example, the Plus mechanism, introduced in 1991 is the feature that keeps the headrest upright as the chair reclines, thus making it much better for reading or watching TV. But, they asked, “How can we make it better?” It was one of the workers in the factory, not someone from the design team, that came up with a clever, but simple mechanism that allowed the Plus mechanism to be disengaged for sleeping, and yet it would automatically re-engage when the chair was brought to an upright position. This was called the sleep mechanism and was introduced in 2001. Current innovations have to do with the shape of the injection-molded foam in the cushions. By having dents or grooves, the foam can feel softer in some areas than others, even though it has the same density throughout. The new Magic chair incorporates this feature.
Seven Sisters waterfall in Geiranger Fjord
The next leg of our journey was a beautiful cruise up the Geiranger Fjord. On our flight from Oslo to Ålesund we had seen a lot of snow in the mountains, and now we were seeing the snowmelt cascading down the cliffs on either side of the fjord. Because of the rain, the snow was melting even faster than normal, so there was an impressive display of waterfalls. I wasn’t counting, but there had to be well over a hundred of them. We finally came to the end of the fjord where we were taken, in classic old cars, up to a visitor center by our hotel. I rode in a 1937 Buick convertible (top up, thankfully) and was told that it was one of only five in the world. At the visitor center we watched a beautiful slide show that was obviously designed to show what the area looked like when is wasn’t raining. The Union Hotel is as nice a place as you would ever want to visit. My room overlooked a meadow, sheer rock cliffs and a roaring stream. I slept with my window open so I could listen to it. Dinner was magnificent with caviar-topped hors d’oeuvres, smoked salmon, lamb and many other traditional Norwegian dishes. I tried one bite of the whale and found it barely edible. From the hotel we could see cruise ships coming and going. They bring about 600,000 visitors there every summer.
Donny blocking the view of Seven Sisters Waterfall
Had I not been told, I never would have guessed that there is a very real and dangerous monster lurking in the Geiranger Fjord area. The monster is a giant hunk of rock (about 120 million cubic meters) on the face of the Akerneset Mountain. It is slipping towards the Fjord at a rate of about two inches per year, and is expected to break loose and tumble into the water some time in the next 100 years. When it does, it will create a tsunami 250 feet high which will race both up and down the fjord. When it reaches the Ekornes factory it will be “only” 20 feet high. They believe that they will have about a one week warning before this happens (presumably because of an acceleration in the slippage). The slippage is monitored constantly and a sophisticated tsunami warning system is in place throughout the region. Ekornes has a contingency plan which involves filling 20-foot shipping containers with sand and making a dike around the factory. I have never heard of this being done, and wondered if that technique might have some use for flood control in the USA and other places.
The next day involved a picturesque bus ride back to Ålesund and lunch at the Ekornes showroom. Then it was back through the tunnels to Vigra and a flight back to Oslo, where we had yet another wonderful dinner at a restaurant by the harbor.
Sculpture in Vigeland Sculpture Park
Saturday was a sight-seeing day in Oslo and, not surprisingly, it was raining—though only lightly. We first went to the Vigeland Sculpture Park, a beautiful 80 acre park right in Oslo. To the casual observer, the 212 bronze and granite sculptures might just look like “a bunch of naked people” but Gustav Vigeland was a philosopher as well as a sculptor, and his work is a celebration of humanity. Our guide discussed some of the philosophy. We visited two museums: one holding a ship used in a polar expedition and the other, the Viking Museum. Two Viking ships from around the year 800 AD had sunk in the harbor and were covered with clay, which protected them from decomposition. They were re-assembled in this museum. One of them was about a hundred feet long and was easily capable of crossing the Atlantic Ocean. Our guide mentioned that there was a pair of skis in Norway that were 4,000 years old! This is the oldest known example of people having made something from bent wood. I remembered watching a worker at the Ekornes factory assembling a base for a Stressless chair: This is a real work of art made from bent and laminated wood. That technology in Norway has progressed for a long time.
Our last stop on the tour was at the Holmenkollen ski jump, which we actually never saw because we were in a cloud. Nevertheless, we had a magnificent lunch. In the lobby of the hotel was a fascinating ice sculpture. It consisted of many large “snowflakes” attached together, and inside of each snowflake was a metal (probably aluminum) plate which was, in turn, attached to a pipe through which cold refrigerant was constantly pumped. The result being that frost formed on the plates, creating a beautiful sculpture.
After another nice dinner at the harbor, I tried to get to bed at a reasonable time, anticipating the long flight home. I awoke the next morning to discover that it doesn’t always rain in Oslo–there wasn’t a cloud in the sky! When I finally got home after being awake for 25 hours, I was tired, but inspired.