Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, is home to 1.6 million people. It is situated on an
archipelago which stretches to the Baltic Sea. Over 60% of the city area consists of
waterways, parks and green spaces.
The city abounds with bridges, towers, steeples, cobbled squares and beautiful parks. There is
a plethora of bars, clubs, restaurants and cafés. In the summer months the pleasure boats are
crammed with tourists travelling between the various islands that are dotted around the
archipelago.
Known as .the Venice of the North., Stockholm was founded by Birger Jarl in 1252. It
became the capital in 1634, during the Thirty Years War. The Old Town (Gamla Stan)
encompasses architecture from medieval times and the city contains over 150 museums and
galleries. However, Stockholm is associated with the most innovative/modern organisations
and brands such as; IKEA, Abba, the Nobel Prize and Ericsson.
In 1996 Philips Corporate Audit asked me to move to Stockholm to set up a Nordic audit
department, which would be responsible for audit coverage in the Scandinavian and Baltic
region.

The Swedish Approach to Customer Service
In keeping with my tried and tested practice, as demonstrated in my early years of scientific
experimentation, of not reading or following instructions. I moved to Stockholm to set up a
Nordic audit department for my company, and did not read in detail the corporate guide to
living in Sweden. Had I done so I maybe would have been a little better prepared for the,
shock is too strong a word, shall we say surprise that greeted me when I went to my local
supermarket. I had, and this I suspect is a widely held view by non Swedes, a preconceived
view of Swedish culture. Namely; a clean, well organised, tolerant, efficient society. I had
expected to see supermarkets akin to the large chains in the UK, well stocked with all manner
of produce. The reality was somewhat different. The supermarkets in central Stockholm are
not as large as those found in the towns of the UK. Consequently the aisles are cramped, and
passage with a trolley often impeded by an abundance of elderly people travelling at a snail.s
pace. With regard to the variety of products offered, I was struck by small quantities held.
Items as basic as potatoes, offered by the barrel load in Britain, were stored in one small hand
basket which more often than not contained four or five rather sad specimens. Bottled water
and toilet rolls seemed to be rather bizarrely rationed, some weeks there would be none at all
in the shop. I very rapidly adopted the Russian technique of buying large quantities of
.staples., when the supermarket graciously consented to stock them, working on the principle
that they may not be there the next week. I did venture on a few occasions to raise the issue
with staff, but my enquiries just received a shrug of the shoulders and a comment that they
did not know when the next shipment would be in.

Nanny Knows Best
Purchases of alcohol in Sweden caused even more problems, than ordinary purchases. The
social democratic party, that governs by consensus in Sweden, had decided many years earlier
that alcohol is a bad thing and that adults should not be allowed to gain access to this most
evil of products; unless under strict government control. Needless to say taxes on alcohol are
extortionately high. Its is therefore hardly surprising that in the North of Sweden, and in other
rural areas, the inhabitants brew their own rather lethal concoctions. However, once you have
overcome the shock of the cost of alcohol actually obtaining it requires inconvenience beyond
merely excessive pecuniary outlay.

Alcohol, anything over 2% that is, can only be purchased for home consumption from
government run shops called System Bolegat, the supermarkets do sell a group of beers with
the Orwellian title of .the peoples beer. running at 2% or less. These, by definition, have no
pleasurable effect and taste disgusting; it goes without saying I would not drink or cook with
these. System Bolegat, enforcing the government ethos of maximum inconvenience for the
consumers, only opened Monday to Friday 9:00-5:00 (when I left Sweden in 2000 they had
started a very bold experiment in Stockholm to open certain selected Bolegats on Saturday
morning). These stores rather reminded me of the old Green Shield stamp shops, the products
neatly arranged behind glass cabinets and listed in a large catalogue. Customers, would write
down the code numbers of the products they wanted; then take a ticket from a ticket dispenser
and wait for their number to come up going to the appropriate counter and placing their order.
Whilst I naturally had to put up with this .nanny knows best. approach for my 5 years there, I
am nonetheless convinced that by treating adults as children merely encourages them to act as
such. I saw just as many, if not more, drunks there as one would encounter in any other
European city; and the limited opening times of the government shops merely encouraged
people to buy more than they needed when they were in there. Additionally, the duty free and
illegal smuggling trade (two sides of the same coin) was booming, and consequently
depriving the government of revenue.
Stängt i Sommar
Swedish people live for the summer, the winters are long, dark (daylight lasts only a few
hours) and cold (sometimes 20 below!). I understand that the winter season sees a steep rise in
the number of suicides. Indeed, during my first week in Stockholm when I was meeting local
management one member of the Board was telling me about the winters, and how bad they
were. As he put it:
.Ken each winter gets more difficult to bare. I sit in my home with my bottle of whisky, but I
don.t know how many more I can take..
Not necessarily the most positive view on life. However, I would like to point out that 5 years
later when I left Stockholm, he was still there and had managed to survive 5 more winters!
The summer is a total contrast to winter, temperatures reach a very pleasant 25 degrees, the
sun rises at 3:00 am and sets after midnight (rather disconcerting to those of us who come
from places a little closer to the equator). It is during this period that the average Swede feels
to urge to go to the countryside, and live in his/her cabin for the summer months. You will
find that all Swedish offices gear the holiday period to this time of year, and encourage their
staff to take at least 4 of their 6 week holiday allowance during this time. That is fine if the
rest of the world takes a similar holiday, but not so fine if it doesn.t (which of course it
doesn.t). I found myself often one of the only members of senior management in the office
during this period. No problem, as I used this period of relative quiet to prepare the audit
plans, and budgets for the coming year.
With regard to one.s daily life, outside of work, this summer vacation proved to be a little
more than inconvenient. Many of Stockholm.s best restaurants and bars would actually shut
for 4-6 weeks, my local dry cleaners and laundry would not open at the weekend. The most
bizarre closure relates to what I would say is an industry that is highly seasonal, and geared
most definitely to the summer months. That industry being ice cream, and the particular
enterprise in question being the Swedish Ice Cream Shop; which claimed to sell genuine, old
fashioned home made Swedish ice cream. Needless to say come the nice hot summer this
particular enterprise shut for the summer, in Swedish the sign you will see on the doors is:
.Stängt i sommar.

 

For more about Accountants Can Cook and Ken Frost, please click on the logo below: