A HAMPSHIRE shopper was stuck in traffic chaos outside an IKEA store which forced her to queue for over three hours.

Stacey Barber, 22, said her day had been ruined by chaos outside a newly opened store in Reading.

Frustrated customers were left beeping their horns yesterday as they struggled to get out of the multi-storey car park.

One man joked it was "easier to leave Europe than the Ikea Reading car park", while another described the scene as "bedlam".

Ms Barber, from Farnborough, said: "We were stuck for three hours and we only went to return something. We didn't get home till 6 so all the shops were shut and missed out on a whole afternoon."

She added that staff handed out bottles of water but had "no idea what they were doing".

"After an hour everyone had enough. It was so hot and a bottle of water goes so far. People started arguing with staff saying 'what is going on?' and they had no answer."

"There were people with two or three kids in the car so they were getting more annoyed. People just kept beeping their cars to get attention but all we got was 'sorry for the delay'."

The store in Reading is the first IKEA to open in the UK in seven years.

Manager Johanna Heuren said a "traffic management plan" would remain in place while they investigated the cause of Sunday's delays.

A mother and daughter from Southampton queued for 27 hours to be the first customers into the new store last week.

Katie and Ella Cook camped outside to relive the experience of Southampton's grand opening in 2009.

"I wanted to bring my daughter along to the opening of IKEA Reading to enjoy the excitement and buzz that a new IKEA store brings," mum Katie said.