POV: now you finally arrive in Sweden, all sweaty with those big luggage. As you get your keys and open the flat you’re staying in. Looks smaller than picture but seems alright. Open the luggage and flop down to no-sheet bed. Oh shoot I need some sheets and duvet! Getting up, feeling thirsty, go to kitchen and look for a mug. There’s no mug! I need to get some things now. But where can I buy them?
<Home appliances>
The first thing that come up to your mind would be IKEA. It depends where you are located, it could be hell of a journey if it is far from your place(In worst case it would be carrying new drawer to bus stop, train and to your place, uphill), But if you are ordering in bulk, you can use delivery! In Lund university, there’s a school program they lend a big school bus and take you to IKEA which is in Malmö. It takes around 40 minutes to go to IKEA.
However, you don’t really have to go all the way to IKEA for your mug! JYSK. Which is similar to IKEA, is in Lund. Can look through there. Also clas Ohlson has a lot of home appliances but does not focus on furnitures. It’s rather like home appliances such as kitchen stuff, laundry stuff. Also there’s Rusta, which, I would say combination of supermarket and Clas Ohlson. This is also in Lund!
For the electronics, I will say electronic, go for Jula or Elgiganten. For example, rice cooker, coffee machine, charger and Elgiganten is more focused on electronic stuffs, and July has additional things like house tools.
For students in Lund, what I would suggest is “Go to Nova” .Nova has all the shops listed except for IKEA. Nova is the one and only shopping mall in Lund. Clas Ohlson, Jula, Normal, Rusta is all there.
<skincare & cosmetics>
For skincare, the easiest, and I would say mostly the cheapest way is to buy in supermarkets such as willys, ica, coop, Lidl
Or like general shopping you can buy from normal
Also, there’s one in apotek. Apotek is actually a ‘pharmacy’ in Sweden, but they also sell lots of skincare products as well
If you want some cosmetics as well as premium products, you can search in kicks or Lyko. They have some fancy make up things. Oh also Ahlen. This is like department store
I would suggest one little Tip: Buy online. Buy it in Amazon. How do you buy if you don’t have any card that works in Sweden or don’t want to handle all those extra transaction fees? Well, one thing is that you can buy a gift card! In express train or in ICA Central. Express train charges five krona for one card but you can charge up to 300 to 1000 krone. ICA has the same, but they don’t charge any fee for a card itself. Can charge up to 150 to 1500 krone as well. Gift cards are magical card as it can make payments for Spotify Netflix, Amazon.
This would put out fire for most of your stay in Sweden. Also almost every brand has their own website, which means you can search if there is one that you are looking for.(Though you need to search in Swedish most of the time). Hope you get good rest with warm duvet and cozy mug in your place!