We get ours from local clothes market for not very much. I’m sure they are not ethically sourced, but I’m not sure Ikea’s are either. And often promos in supermarkets, so you have time in next few months.
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You can get IKEA to deliver to pick up points for about half the usual deliver cost of having it delivered to your house. Well worth it if you order a trailer full of stuff.
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You can also do click & collect at ikea.
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Don’t worry about flannels, tell them to bring their own
@kirsteastevenson @NotALot @Mat_Davies
Thank you sop much all of you for your suggestions. In fact I’ve gone the home delivery route and added some other things, 6.90€ delivery - just brilliant since by the time we’ve driven to Bordeaux and paid the peage costs just getting to and from Ikea is about 50€.
I never realised I could do this as, years back, when Ikea didn’t have a delivery system we had to go to the delivery company in the building next to Ikea and it was an absolute nightmare. When I was phoning their office for the umpteenth time to find out where our delivery had got to and I told the woman on the phone her company’s service was a “disaster” she laughed, and said “I know”. It kind of put me off ever thinking about getting anything delivered from Ikea. Oh the benefits of SF!
OH wants to know is it possible to get their Swedish meatballs delivered? 
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Oooh no! My intention is always to go above and beyond. That’s how I get them to come back year after year. 
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I honestly think I’ve been doing this gite stuff for far too long. We used to think like that, but after a while realised that it’s not the things you put in to try to tempt people to return, its who you are and where you are that really matters.
I wouldn’t be impressed with that on my holiday.
Then you have to cart a bunch of damp flannels back home, ugh, or else do without which is a minor irritant but still an irritant. I like my personal idiosyncratic comforts which probably explains why I rarely go anywhere nowadays.
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We are coming to the conclusion that we just want to have our home to ourselves from now on.
That doesn’t mean that we didn’t like having guests and we really appreciated the comments they put in our book.
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that’s what we do with ours too
A machine that makes proper coffee, the simplest will do but there’s nothing worse than a gîte or mobile home without a coffee machine (although fortunately I’ve never come across one here) would be a bit like staying somewhere in the UK and there being no kettle 
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Likewise, and after a while when the guest book was full of exactly the same comments (thank you for a wonderful holiday, we’ve had a great time and we’ll definitely be back next year) we didn’t see much point in replacing it!
And who I am is that I spoil my guests, make sure I go beyond what they need, which is why I’ve asked here what I need to provide for French guests. I understand my UK guests better. And I don’t get two lines in a visitors book, I get half a page and only 5 star reviews (again, whole stories) on Vrbo, which is why I’m still with Vrbo, much as I hate them.
We’re lucky with our locality, but there are lots of gites around here all able to say what a beautiful part of France this is, I HAVE to do more than that. I have repeat guests who have moved their bookings yet again. Why on earth would I NOT go to the trouble of providing exactly what my guests want? It’s that which saves me from having to spend a fortune on marketing.
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It’s funny you say that as I do remember reading at the start of the pandemic, I think during the first lockdowns, that they actually partnered with deliveroo in the U.K. and Door Dash or the like in the US to deliver food to customers (local-ish to stores obviously) since the in store restaurants were closed! I think it was more focused on meal boxes for you to cook your own or such, but i distinctly remember the headlines in the articles focusing on exactly your comment; ‘missing your IKEA meatballs fix? Get it delivered to your home!’
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Oh I just thought if you have older people and older children then a packet of chicorée is handy, lots of people like it to dilute their coffee or to weaken children’s café au lait, obv they disapprove of cafe au lait a bit because you know what a strain it puts on one’s liver (that’s what they say, nonsense for me but chacun son truc).
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Well I doubt you would be interested in a eco-gîte surrounded by walking, cycling and extreme sports activities - and with few cafés and restaurants! It suits our clientele.
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That’s the whole point, isn’t it. Knowing what your own clientele wants - which is why at the moment I am more than a tad outside my comfort zone!
We managed to find individual sachets of ricoré…horrid stuff! (Although no longer provide it our friend who drank it died, and it is nestlé)
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sorry, just written something tactless and deleted it