Can you name Ikea's most popular line?

You won't find it in the catalogue. You won't even find it flat-packed on the shelves. And you certainly won't have to queue up for an hour just to buy it.

But Ikea's little brown engraved pencil has become the latest must-have item.

Actually, make that 'must-steal' because millions of the implements given to customers to fill in their order forms are pilfered each year.

One shopper even managed to walk out of a store with 84 pencils - and he didn't even buy any furniture.

Another customer makes special ' restocking' trips, wearing jogging pants that can hold handfuls of them, according to one store's staff. Small wonder then that, with so many in circulation, the pencils are finding far more uses than just for writing down the serial numbers of self-assembly wardrobes.

Bingo players on cruise ships in the Med have been spotted marking their cards with them, golfers use them to mark their scorecards and some teachers keep a few spare to give out to pupils.

One pencil even ended up on eBay, although the opening bid was just 1p.

The Swedish furniture giant is reluctant to discuss the matter. All a spokesman would say was: 'We provide the pencils to help customers place orders and we are happy to continue this service.' But staff say the scale of theft is enormous.

'Some people walk out with handfuls in their pockets,' said a Glasgow worker.

'If the same thing happens in Edinburgh and at the other ten stores south of the Border, the number of pencils we are losing in a year must run into millions.'

The craze follows in the great British tradition of petty pilfering.

Travelodge hotels are regularly cleaned out of shampoo, soap, tea and coffee - and the occasional TV remote control.

Bookmaker William Hill says 80,000 of its blue pens go missing every day, while Argos has to order 'several million' of its plastic pens each year.