Italian IKEA Takes in Stray Dogs for the Holidays

Talk about getting into the holiday spirit: The news went viral right before Thanksgiving about how an IKEA store in Italy was taking in stray dogs. The employees there were upset about the dogs being stranded outside in the freezing weather and decided to do something about it.

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The IKEA store in Catania, Italy, really made the store feel like a home, with the dogs lounging on furniture and sleeping on rugs. In addition to giving the pups a warm place to stay for the winter, an ABC News report says that the shop staff also groomed and fed the dogs. Some of the strays have even been adopted by workers in the store on Sicily’s eastern coast.

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You have to check out this Facebook video of the dogs in IKEA. There's even a dog lounging along with wrapped presents near a Christmas tree. Even though the video is in Italian, you can clearly hear the videographer saying bella and bellissimo—beautiful or pretty in Italian. This video has been viewed more than a million times in general and shared more than 18,000 times on the social media platform.

According to the same ABC News story, this isn't the first time that IKEA has taken in stray dogs. In fact, the Swedish retailer first did this in the United States in 2014 as part of its "Home for Hope" program that encourages pet adoption.

A store in Arizona didn't have stray dogs, per se, in the store. But it did have life-size cutouts of the animals there. Customers could use their smartphone to scan for more information about each adoptable pet. According to this news article, all the animals were adopted.

Back in Italy, the dogs are extremely popular with shoppers.

Here is what an IKEA spokesperson told ABC News:

"Straying is a widespread problem in Sicily and IKEA has always been sensitive to animal issues and welfare. Specifically, this problem has been affecting our store in Catania for quite some time now, as there are many stray dogs that are normally hanging around the car park outside the store. These dogs sometimes find repair in the entrance and exit areas of the store, although this is not part of a particular corporate initiative."