The city of Surprise is using an international holiday dedicated to meatballs to court one of the city's top-requested retailers: IKEA.
"When we discovered there was a Swedish Meatball Day, we thought, 'Let's just have some fun,'" said Surprise's economic development director, Jeanine Jerkovic.
The West Valley municipality, which has a population of more than 160,000, launched a campaign video last week highlighting the city's love for the furniture store's popular meatballs in addition to its other products.
IKEA was named as one of the top three retailers requested by more than 5,300 residents who completed a survey by the city this year. And with recent news that IKEA is on the hunt for 17 new locations in the U.S., Surprise decided to take a unique approach to capture the Swedish retailer's attention.
