IKEA Price Tracker: a tool for monitoring household products

How much can an IKEA price tracker save you?

Recently, a friend complained to me that he had been looking at a sofa from Ikea for three months, but the price dropped by 300 bucks just two days after he ordered it. This is something I know very well, last year to buy bookcases also encountered a similar situation. In fact, as long as you use the right method.It's really not hard to save a few thousand dollars a year on furniture purchasesThe key is to keep up with real-time price developments.

Too tired to compare prices manually? Teach you to monitor automatically

First of all, a real case: Wang found in the decoration, IKEA the same curtains in different cities stores price difference can reach 15%. If you rely on manual daily brush the web page, it is estimated that the decoration is not finished people first exhausted. Here we teach you to use Python to write a simple monitoring script, focusing on how to use proxy IP to avoid being blocked:

import requests
from bs4 import BeautifulSoup

def check_price(url):
    proxies = {
        "http": "http://username:password@gateway.ipipgo.com:9020",
        "https": "http://username:password@gateway.ipipgo.com:9020"
    }
    try.
        response = requests.get(url, proxies=proxies, timeout=10)
        soup = BeautifulSoup(response.text, 'html.parser')
         Here the selector is adjusted according to the actual page structure
        price = soup.select('span.product-price')[0].text
        return float(price.strip('¥'))
    except Exception as e.
        print("Catch error:", e)

 Example product link
url = 'https://www.ikea.cn/p/123456'
current_price = check_price(url)

Take care to replace username and password with your own authentication information obtained from the ipipgo backend.Three times over: always use a proxy! Use a proxy! Use a proxy!If you climb the Ikea website directly, you will be blocked in less than 10 requests.

Wrong proxy IP = wasted effort

Comparison of common proxy services in the market (here is a table for more visualization):

After using three or four service providers, I found that ipipgo'sCity-level positioningIt's especially useful. For example, if you want to compare IKEA pricing in Beijing and Guangzhou, you can directly specify the exit IP of the corresponding city, and the data is accurate.

A Deployment Program Even a White Guy Can Handle

Don't be intimidated by the code, it's really just four steps:

1. Sign up for an ipipgo account (newcomers get 5G of traffic for nothing)
2. Generate the API key in the console
3. Change the proxy configuration in the code to your own.
4. Setting of timed tasks (automatic run at 8 a.m. every day)

There is a tricky way: using the enterprise WeChat robot to push price fluctuations to the phone, much more timely than email alerts. Just last week, I used this method to catch a 30% discount on a double mattress, saving more than 800.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What should I do if I am always prompted for a verification code?
A: Adjust the request interval to more than 30 seconds, ipipgo's rotating IP function can be used with the random wait time

Q: Will I be blocked if I need to monitor multiple items?
A: Use theirMulti-Threading PackageIf you have 5 monitoring tasks running at the same time, remember to use different IPs for each task.

Q: Where is the historical price data stored?
A: Beginners are advised to save graphite documents, advanced can use the Tencent cloud function + database, ipipgo technical support can help to configure the

Woolgathering is the most cost-effective way

Finally, I'll share a secret: IKEA's official website'sPrice tag color metaphysics.. Red tags represent sales, yellow is clearance, and monitoring the color change immediately gets you started. Combined with ipipgo's real-time alerts, it helped the studio save more than $20,000 on purchases last year.

Honestly, it would be better to just use an off-the-shelf service. ipipgo that!Traffic packs on demandThe model is especially suitable for our kind of home party that needs to compare prices occasionally. Recently, they have an event, enter the coupon code "IKEA2023″ can also be 20% off, the need to stock up on some traffic.