Shoppers were trapped in a car park for more than three hours as they attempted to leave a newly opened Ikea store at the weekend.

The store in Reading is the first new Ikea to open in the UK in seven years. Manager Johanna Heuren said a traffic management plan would remain in place while the cause of Sunday’s delays was investigated.

One man joked that it was “easier to leave Europe” than the store’s multi-storey car park.

Rory Firth, 40, from Maidenhead, said: “It was just bedlam. We were stuck for about an hour but a lot of people were stuck for upwards of three hours. We were on level one so we were quite lucky. I had my four-year-old and 10-month-old in the back seat so we were fortunate to get out when we did.”

Stacey Barber, 22, from Farnborough, Hampshire, said the three-hour delay had ruined her day’s shopping. She 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 we missed out on a whole afternoon.”

Barber said staff handed out bottles of water but otherwise had “no idea what they were doing”.

She said: “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 to get attention but all we got was ‘sorry for the delay’.”

Ikea’s Heuren said: “We can confirm that there was a delay with regards to customers exiting the Ikea Reading car park on Sunday afternoon. The number of visitors to the store was in line with the previous busy days during the opening weekend where our traffic management plan worked efficiently as planned.

“Our traffic management team responded to keep cars moving as quickly as possible and we’d like to thank customers for being patient and understanding of the situation.”

In 2005 several people were injured and others suffered heat exhaustion following the opening of an Ikea in Edmonton, north London. About 6,000 people – triple the number expected by the company – descended on the store, forcing it to close its doors temporarily.