The composite is used in 50 other Ikea products. Long-life products enhance value by eliminating the need to buy new products. To achieve longer life, manufacturers can provide repair and maintenance services, as well as market components for a long time. Ikea's highly commercially successful Klippan sofa, introduced in 1979, has a removable cloth cover. Ikea offers new covers to replace old ones when they are worn out or no longer attractive.
Consumers can even buy paper patterns so they can make new covers themselves.
With rising costs for raw materials and energy as well as for waste disposal, product take-back programs are fast becoming an economically and ecologically desirable alternative to land filling. Germany's Grammer Co. guarantees to take back and reuse its Natura office chairs without cost to the consumer. Where possible, returned chairs are disassembled and the parts are separated, tested, and used in the manufacture of new chairs.