TLG acquires Bricklink

[anothergol]

22 minutes ago, Captain Dee said:

Buying out competition for the purpose of eliminating said competition altogether is entirely about making money, especially when the buyer shuts down the bought.

Well when you buy & shut, it's more about losing less than making.

But here the competition isn't BL, it's all of the other brands. I could totally have imagined BL becoming a generic brick market, in that way it makes sense for Lego to buy it just to limit it to Lego, which is already their very first move.
The announcement also tells about "an opportunity", implying that it's more BL that offered the deal, & thus perhaps it was simply good & cheap enough for Lego.

But let's face it, AFOL money is pockey money for Lego, I don't think it's directly for the money that they care. Lego values their image, and that requires control on everything that touches it, and they seem to like control, which they see they're losing since today "Lego" means "all brick brands".

Edited November 26, 2019 by anothergol

[anothergol]

10 minutes ago, MxWinters said:

With LEGO's recent behavior with going after people for things like custom/3D printed parts, printing/chroming ect as @Peppermint_M said, I have no faith that this is going to work

Oh yeah I forgot about 3D printing. With resin printers being so cheap, & chinese manufacturers so ready to produce custom parts, I could have imagine many Brickarms clones as tiny new businesses. Now obviously that's not gonna happen, not on BL.

Is Lego also against chroming? (why?)

 

(something funky is happening when I'm posting here. It repeats my last message & loses the one I just typed?)

Edited November 26, 2019 by anothergol

[Captain Dee]

10 minutes ago, anothergol said:

Well when you buy & shut, it's more about losing less than making.

But here the competition isn't BL, it's all of the other brands. I could totally have imagined BL becoming a generic brick market, in that way it makes sense for Lego to buy it just to limit it to Lego, which is already their very first move.
The announcement also tells about "an opportunity", implying that it's more BL that offered the deal, & thus perhaps it was simply good & cheap enough for Lego.

But let's face it, AFOL money is pockey money for Lego, I don't think it's directly for the money that they care.

That's the extreme example, yes, quite rare in practice, and requires one to be supremely confident in one's position, but it still comes down to making money. But yeah, it has nothing to do with this scenario.

Perhaps TLG will stop with abolishing the real competition from Bricklink -- those other clone brands and such.

@GREG998 The link isn't working for me. Anyone else?

Edited November 26, 2019 by Captain Dee

[Grover]

I was hoping this was a joke, but apparently it is not.

If TLG wanted to tap into the AFOL community, they could spend more time on LUGs and buy sales data from BrickLink.  Since they're not accepting applications for new LUGs and they purchased all of BL, I doubt these are the case.  I cannot believe that the AFOL community revenue would justify the purchase of BL, even if you include the Stud.io etc.

On the other hand, if TLG wanted to try and control the secondary market, this would be a good way to go: They can cut off BL sellers from purchasing from B&P and PAB, restrict anyone making custom prints from buying these items, and get rid of the BL sellers who sell guns, etc. that they don't want out there that they feel reflects poorly on the brand.  I think this is a real shame, as there are a lot of opportunities out there that are great for AFOLs, even if TLG doesn't support them.  My worry is that they will blacklist people to buy Lego because they have build adult-themed MOCs and such.  Linking multiple accounts now that they have control of BL could be easier for them.

Of course, I bet BrickOwl and Ebay are very happy about this.  Anyone with some decent coding skills should be gearing up to create a sellers marketplace as well.  This bodes well for sellers leaving BL and migrating to another platform.  It will be interesting to see what that platform is.

Edited November 26, 2019 by Grover

[hagridshut]

Surprising news.

I purchase items only sporadically on Bricklink, but it has been an excellent reference resource for sets and components.  

I am adopting a wait-and-see perspective on this event.

[dr_spock]

1 hour ago, anothergol said:

No, that can't change pricing in local shops, because it's only dictated by offer & demand. If it can affect anything, it's Lego's own pricing.

If BL stopped working like a stock market, with parts costing the same in every shop, it would be its end, that would make no sense.

Would they have a say in Bricklink's seller fees?

 

[Ankoku]

I don't think BL would ever sell their sales data to LEGO. Data these days is often the worth of the company more than anything else. The only way LEGO was likely to get the data was by buying the company.

I remember a presentation a while back where the LEGO Group was suggesting they were okay with things like 3rd party gun sellers, as it was something LEGO couldn't do themselves. I think LEGO has to remove that stuff from BL and anything not made by LEGO by default. That is the sacrifice from BL side of things. e.g. I don't seem them actively trying to stop the sale of guns etc. elsewhere.

If we actually knew what they paid for BL, it would answer a few questions.

[JopieK]

Well, let's see... BrickLink sellers buy LEGO and sell it to mostly AFOLs, if AFOLs can't get bricks anymore at an affordable price it will hurt LEGO in many ways... If it doesn't work out other initiatives like BrickOwl will get their chance...

[coinoperator]

Let try to find an answer about WHY did BL sell itself to tlc
oh man, Jezec turns around in his grave

[andythenorth]

April 1st already?

Hanlon's razor.  https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor

TLG will screw this up.  I think it's an interesting move though.  Bricklink has been one of the great examples of a non-evil marketplace community in an internet that's increasingly full of twisted nonsense that's rotting society.   On the other hand...nothing lasts for ever. 

[Captain Dee]

1 hour ago, Grover said:

I was hoping this was a joke, but apparently it is not.

If TLG wanted to tap into the AFOL community, they could spend more time on LUGs and buy sales data from BrickLink.  Since they're not accepting applications for new LUGs and they purchased all of BL, I doubt these are the case.  I cannot believe that the AFOL community revenue would justify the purchase of BL, even if you include the Stud.io etc.

On the other hand, if TLG wanted to try and control the secondary market, this would be a good way to go: They can cut off BL sellers from purchasing from B&P and PAB, restrict anyone making custom prints from buying these items, and get rid of the BL sellers who sell guns, etc. that they don't want out there that they feel reflects poorly on the brand.  I think this is a real shame, as there are a lot of opportunities out there that are great for AFOLs, even if TLG doesn't support them.  My worry is that they will blacklist people to buy Lego because they have build adult-themed MOCs and such.  Linking multiple accounts now that they have control of BL could be easier for them.

I don't have reasonable access to a LUG and didn't know they weren't taking more. Anyone know the rationale behind it? Has TLG grown weary of that approach? (Sorry for going off topic...)

As for the whole PaB/B&P resellers thing: does anyone know for sure if this has happened? I don't really see what difference it ever would've made to TLG, but I can definitely see them stopping people from doing it, just because they probably now can.

[Erik Leppen]

Now this is a susprise.

Not sure what to think. I'm not really worried about the availabiltiy of official Lego parts, but what kinds of consequences does this have for things like Brickarms, Chromebricks, custom (aluminum) parts, and other such "fan-created additions" to the building system?

[Lego David]

Is there any way to know how much TLG payed to acquire BL? I'm very curious.

[Grover]

13 minutes ago, Captain Dee said:

I don't have reasonable access to a LUG and didn't know they weren't taking more. Anyone know the rationale behind it? Has TLG grown weary of that approach? (Sorry for going off topic...)

As for the whole PaB/B&P resellers thing: does anyone know for sure if this has happened? I don't really see what difference it ever would've made to TLG, but I can definitely see them stopping people from doing it, just because they probably now can.

I don't have access to a LUG or a Lego store easily either, which is frustrating to me.  I don't know why they quit accepting new LUGs, but the fact that they are not does not speak well to customer relations with AFOLs.

As for selling customer data, @Ankoku, companies and organizations do it all the time, even personal data.  If a company has any ethics, they might scrub personal data, but I would bet that a small company like BrickLink would be happy to sell sales statistics (# of pieces sold in what color, etc.) to TLG, as it would benefit both of them.  That would be relatively cheap compared to the sale of the entire company.

Maybe all this will be for the best, but large corporations buying up companies like this, especially when they have the market share on after-market sales... it definitely does not look good and I am very suspicious.

[johnnym]

Definitely not strictly Technic but see for yourself:

https://www.bricklink.com/v2/community/newsview.page?msgid=1166622

What is the impact of that move? I'm a little shocked to say the least.

 

UPDATE: Ah, sorry, didn't saw that:

...as I usually enter Eurobricks via "LEGO Technic and Model Team" only.

Edited November 26, 2019 by johnnym
Linked main topic

[Masked Mini]

This has the potential to be quite sinister.

Not a lot of AFOLs know of or appreciate "Bricks and Minifigs" but they are the largest US franchise of brick and mortar Lego resale shops.
Lego JUST annexed/Anschluss the Franchise as an Official Lego Group Partner, a week or so ago.
Sure they are now allowed to sell new sets, bought at wholesale but are required to dedicate x square footage of their store to new sets.
The entire Franchise is now going to rebrand to Lego colors and will lose it's own Identity essentially morphing into mom+pop Lego Group Stores.
An insane mish mash of family store with corporate overlord... how long before they are told how to run the rest of their businesses?
The best hope is that they are allowed to continue to run independently to preserve that small shop vibe as a counterpoint to the corporate stores.
 
We will see if TLG will follow up this Annex by sending C&Ds to the other brick and mortar Lego resale shops that run on the BAM model.

A rumor I was definitely not told by a friendly BAM owner was that Lego is trying to secure alternate product outlets to decrease Walmart's leverage on TLG.
It sounds plausible but no way to verify or debunk.

I am deeply affected by both these acquisitions as I buy the bulk of my... bulk and build my minifigures at BAM and most of my specialized parts on BL.
I spend a tiny fraction of my annual lego expenditure on new sets, S@H, PAB or Lego's Build a mini towers.

I'm getting a massive "The Mouse" vibe here. Straight out of the Disney playbook.

[Andy D]

If TLG works with Bricklink resellers this could be the best thing to happen to Bricklink an buyers and sellers. I just hope availability fo parts does not suffer.

[AnyColourYouLike]

I hope they're not bumping the prices up, or something like that. That'd be bad.

[ShaydDeGrai]

46 minutes ago, Grover said:

(snip) Anyone with some decent coding skills should be gearing up to create a sellers marketplace as well.  This bodes well for sellers leaving BL and migrating to another platform.  It will be interesting to see what that platform is.

Funny, as someone with 15+ years experience in web development, this was my second thought as well (my first was "What the f...?")  I sincerely believe that if this whole thing turns out to be a disaster, the market itself will survive.  Buyers and sellers will find (or create) new venues and the free market will win out under a new umbrella, it just might take some time.  At worst, this is an inconvenient delay (that will no doubt hurt many in the community) but it's not the end of a sub-culture.  This genie left the bottle twenty years ago and while TLG might be able to wave it newly purchased bottle around, sticking the cork back in at this point isn't going to capture the genie.  If people don't like changes that come under TLG's control, they'll just close up their BL shops in favor of BrickOwl, eBay or whatever other option comes along.  No disrespect to the people behind BL or BO, but, at its heart, the software isn't _that_ sophisticated; the right people with the right skills and the right motivation could cook up a viable alternative to BL and, with the possible exception of post-aquisition non-compete clauses for current BL staff, TLG wouldn't have any say in the matter.  TLG can't stop you from parting out and reselling kits you bought as a general consumer (reselling LUG-bulk buys and charitable donations from Lego might be a trickier matter but kits, PAB cups filled at stores, etc. are fair game) and if BL becomes an unfavorable place for sellers and buyers to meet, they'll just find someplace else to hook up.  The internet is a big place.

That said, I don't _know_ that this buy-out is a bad thing (though it does make me nervous).  Maybe they'll leave things pretty much alone and simply try to learn how and why the BL culture works.  Maybe they'll crack down on unlicensed compatible parts,  beat us over the head with the "Official" names of colors and parts, and threaten to ban anyone who forgets to put the little registered trademark symbol after the word "LEGO" in our private messages.  Maybe they'll deliberately mis-manage it so badly that when they finally shut it down people will be grateful it's gone; who knows?

Strategically though, I don't see the upside no matter how they play this.  If they want to learn how to better connect with AFOLs or improve their software for a MOC oriented audience, they could have done that by buying metadata from BL or hiring consultants (even possibly BL software developers) to improve their own in-house offerings - get the knowledge without assuming day-to-day operations of a foreign business model.  If they are trying to protect their brand from dilution or inappropriate associations, they've actually moved in the wrong direction - Bricklink as a wholly independent entity allowed them deniability, now everything any BL seller does has the implicit blessing of TLG unless TLG launches a crackdown against any BL seller that deals in goods, services or policies that TLG disapproves of.  If they are trying to control the secondary market, then they are delusional, they have a hard enough time dealing with clones and knock-offs on the primary market.  If they were trying endear themselves to AFOLs, maybe they should have just opened up B&P as a BL shop and focused on competitive pricing.

Whether their intentions are good or ill, I think I'm most concerned for the software side of things.  I don't know if TLG writes their own software in-house or hires it out to development shops, but the one thing their software has proven time and time again is that they are a toy company that makes physical bricks, not a software house.  When it comes to software, they're just not very good designing it and they lack the commitment to maintain it.  Their shop web-site is marginal at best, software tie-ins to their kits over the years typically see the programs abandoned before they even wring all the bugs out of them; even large, heavily lauded efforts like LDD and Lego Universe just seem to come and go like pet-projects run by someone with a short attention span.  Even if they chose to do nothing today with the BL site and Stud.io, it seems like it would only be a matter of time before they'd start tinkering in a well meaning effort to 'improve' things with their reverse-Midas touch and end up either diminishing what they've got or replacing it with something unrecognizable and less desirable.

 

[The Reader]

1 hour ago, hagridshut said:

but it has been an excellent reference resource for sets and components

IMHO, this is the best part of BL. What will happen to this datas concerning sets, parts and minifigs? I hope they will be kept online. But as had been said before - wait and see.

[Thirdwigg]

My post from The Pub.

I saw this morning that Bricklink.com was acquired by TLG, and my mouth hit the floor.

While many of us can list the set that brought us out of the dark ages, for me, it was Bricklink, so I am a little apprehensive about this change. Bricklink has opened up this hobby to me, and has allowed me to do a number of MOCs. I hope moving forward, this acquisition will will not be too disruptive to element acquisition..

I will say, that in the last two years, I have bought more pieces directly from TLG as their Replacement Bricks site gets better. While there are some organizations issues that Bricklink does better, maybe this change will help them provide improved access to new and used elements.

[Joebot]

20 minutes ago, Masked Mini said:

This has the potential to be quite sinister.
 

It certainly does. I'm trying to reserve judgement until we have more information, but ... this could be quite dire. Bricklink plays such a unique and vital role in the AFOL community.

I could see TLG deciding that the secondary market is too much of a competitive threat, so they bought Bricklink with the intent of either jacking up seller fees so TLG gets their cut, or they shut it down altogether. Obviously other secondary markets exist, but Bricklink is THE main one. With this one move, TLG now controls a vast share of the secondary market, and that makes me very uneasy. I simply don't trust their motives. 

 

[coinoperator]

52 minutes ago, Erik Leppen said:

consequences

None at all.
It's not prohibited to make these parts as long as you don't use the brandname Lego.

[Grover]

My other question is what's going to happen to licensed parts on the secondary market?  TLG tries not to sell licensed parts on B&P now.  If they own BL and have an agreement with the IP company to avoid selling their licensed parts, could this mean the end of SW and other licensed parts (printed or not) on BL?  It could be that these parts are banned in this manner.

[coinoperator]

Just now, Grover said:

My other question is what's going to happen to licensed parts on the secondary market?  TLG tries not to sell licensed parts on B&P now.  If they own BL and have an agreement with the IP company to avoid selling their licensed parts, could this mean the end of SW and other licensed parts (printed or not) on BL?  It could be that these parts are banned in this manner.

than they will be sold on another website and tlg misses the selling fee's

13 minutes ago, The Reader said:

IMHO, this is the best part of BL. What will happen to this datas concerning sets, parts and minifigs? I hope they will be kept online. But as had been said before - wait and see.

there is also peeron