Lego at risk of 'genericide'

[legoman19892]

In the US the term "Cola" has all but vanished from the spoken language. It mostly only exists on the labels of products. The conversation will go "Coke please" "We have Pepsi is that OK" "Sure".

That isn't generification. The customer wants the Coca Cola brand, not Pespi in that example.

[rodiziorobs]

That isn't generification. The customer wants the Coca Cola brand, not Pespi in that example.

Although you're probably right for this example, its not always the case. I had roommates from the south, one would ask for a Coke from the fridge, and the other would ask what kind.

The response? "Orange."

Not to mention the only pop/soda/soft drink we had in the fridge was the generic store brand anyway.

What this has to do with Lego I'm not sure Sorry mods!

Edited May 30, 2014 by rodiziorobs

[The Rancor]

I have some second cousins around 10 years old and someone once tried to give them some Mega stuff, and they immediately realised that it was not Lego then treated it as a separate toy to the the rest of the Lego. It was Barbie branded which could be a draw - people arguably recognise that brand as a girls' toy more than 'Friends' despite the fact that from what I've seen of Friends the builds couldn't be beaten. Because some of these brands actually overtake the maker's brand in terms of graphic design on the box, (some) people see Halo or Barbie or even Call of Duty and just think great, a Call of Duty playset my son will love that! Clearly people often notice when non-licensed property is not Lego because some brands such as Mega have barely any of their own themes at all. It's certainly clear in the Argos catalogue.

[AmperZand]

...it was some Japanese brand I hadn't even heard of. I don't remember the name, but I do remember they didn't even have a website. The bricks didn't fit together well...

Shame you can't remember the name. I'm surprised that there's a low quality Japanese clone brand. Japanese consumers normally demand high quality products, hence the popularity of real LEGO there. Now if it were Chinese, that wouldn't surprise me at all.

[Aanchir]

My 5-yr old son knows and understands the difference between Lego and other brands. When we go to the store, he is excited to see everything on the Lego aisle, but doesn't even bat an eye when we go past the Megabloks and Kre-o.

I swear I did not teach him to do this.

He even has a little off-brand race car set that a well-intentioned aunt gave him, which he stores in the same box as his Lego. When he mixes up all his sets to build something new (something which drives his mother crazy, but doesn't bother me), he deliberately puts that car aside to make sure he doesn't accidentally mix it in as well.

I on the other hand make an exception for Tyco super blocks. I don't have a ton of them (and I am careful not to use any when building for a contest), but I feel like they are every bit as good in quality as Lego. (Apparently TLG thought so, as well, which is why Tyco was forced to stop making them about 20 years ago.)

I had a big pink bucket of Tyco as a kid, and it got mixed in with my LEGO sometimes, but eventually I realized I'd want to keep it separate. The biggest challenge was separating white 1x1 round bricks because they were near-identical, but the difference was important: a LEGO 1x1 round brick can attach and detach just fine from a 3.2mm bar or aerial, while a Tyco one would get stuck for some reason (either a different material or slightly different geometry).

Tyco had much better quality in terms of color, texture, and geometry than any other clone brands I had back then. Mega Bloks was easy to tell apart from LEGO because it simply "felt cheap". I hear Mega Bloks is better quality these days, and I certainly hope so, but it's been years since I've had to handle it.

[62Bricks]

Although you're probably right for this example, its not always the case. I had roommates from the south, one would ask for a Coke from the fridge, and the other would ask what kind.

The response? "Orange."

Not to mention the only pop/soda/soft drink we had in the fridge was the generic store brand anyway.

What this has to do with Lego I'm not sure Sorry mods!

Yes, in the American South, "Coke" is a generic word for any kind of soft drink. It's the same kind of generalization that is happening to LEGO.

[BirdOPrey5]

I must say my experience with the clone brands "Flegos" if you will has been presently surprising. The brick quality of BricTek, Kre-o, Mega Bloks, and Sluban are very close to or identical to Lego in some cases. I have a few more brand sets waiting to be built I want to try. I won't mix the pieces with Lego but I will display them side by side.

Edited May 31, 2014 by BirdOPrey5

[Chocolatecake]

It's an interesting question, I think it varies a bot geographically. Here in the Land of the Lego clone brands are rarely seen. I remember seeing some TNMT clone stuff in a video rental place back when the very first TMNT movie came out, and that is the only example I remember. My brother bought my nephew somi Cobi stuff online once, and my nephew always referred to it as the "military Lego", but I have never seen it in stores here. I think it's safe to say that at least in Denmark, "Lego" still means "Lego", not the other stuff.

Go to Toys R Us or BR there you'll find Kre-o.

And The Barbie Megabloks and Hello Kitty, I have seen them on my way, maybe in the big supermarkets or the bookstore.

The tiny japanese constructionsets are found in some of the bookstores in here Odense.

[ResIpsaLoquitur]

I suspect that Lego will keep a lock on its brand name. As mentioned, "Coke" is a generic term for cola in certain parts of the U.S., but Coca-Cola is doing just fine with its brand name.

[emilstorm]

Go to Toys R Us or BR there you'll find Kre-o.

And The Barbie Megabloks and Hello Kitty, I have seen them on my way, maybe in the big supermarkets or the bookstore.

The tiny japanese constructionsets are found in some of the bookstores in here Odense.

Maybe I haven't been looking close enough:) I have actually gone and looked for them in several BR's and never found them, but it was about a year ago, maybe things have changed in little DK:) My impression is still that those brands don't do very well here. Maybe I should go have a look again next time I pass a toy store:)

[SweetiePie88]

I can't lie, I used to think of lego as an almost separate class in the plastic brick building world, but they are fading into the crowd. Not all plastic brick building catagories, but the really good bricks like kreo and megabloks.

However, i am noticing a major weakness in lego. the other companies are starting to really step up their game set wise especially mega bloks doing those kapow figures and really good looking spongebob coming later on in the year and the price versus piece count is decent and there aren't a ton of itty bitty parts to pad the count. On the other hand, things seem to be stalling on the lego side as far as set variety goes and the prices are creeping up and up to unfair levels and more and more of the itty bittys are sneaking it. Like the agents set, the little one with 2 minifigures, atv/boat thing, 2 little containers with a part or 2 each, and thats it. It's 12 bucks when it should be closer to 8, maybe 9, dollars. I could understand if the set had really big pieces and/or really rare or new parts but this set has neither. And that tiny police set with 2 minifigures, the motorcycle, and the "wall" that's 7 bucks, that should be closer to 5, maybe 6.

Plus lego used to have little impulse buy sets for 8 bucks or less but now that doesn't really exisit that much anymore. The only things that fit in that catagory that are easily found in stores that I've seen or heard of (polybags DO NOT count in my book since they tend to be MAJOR league YMMV cases) are the creator 5 buck things, a couple city sets, the friend animals mixels, and CMF's.

[brickmaninLA]

At least from the people/families with children I have known over the years, the sense I get is that once people experience the quality of LEGO sets, they don't tend to go back to the other alternatives. (Assuming they didn't start with LEGO building sets to begin with.) But again, that's only judging by people I know, so it's not saying much.

I do agree that there are more than a fair share of people referring to non-LEGO sets as LEGO, but maybe it keeps the brand name out there in situations where it otherwise wouldn't?

I haven't ever bought Megabloks or Kreo pieces/sets, and I don't like when stores like Toys R Us put them up in the same aisles as LEGO (started seeing that recently in some stores out here), but I'm not too concerned, since there is little doubt that more competition (on price and product) works in our favor anyway.

[GregoryBrick]

Plus lego used to have little impulse buy sets for 8 bucks or less but now that doesn't really exisit that much anymore. The only things that fit in that catagory that are easily found in stores that I've seen or heard of (polybags DO NOT count in my book since they tend to be MAJOR league YMMV cases) are the creator 5 buck things, a couple city sets, the friend animals mixels, and CMF's.

So they don't have little impulse buy sets except for: Creator sets (three at $5), City sets (five at $7), Friends animal sets (three at $5), Mixels (eighteen of them at $5), and minifigures? I haven't even mentioned the $8-$12 sets. I don't think it's possible for LEGO to meet your criteria. You should link to some of the older impulse buys which you think were significantly better.

[Lyichir]

So they don't have little impulse buy sets except for: Creator sets (three at $5), City sets (five at $7), Friends animal sets (three at $5), Mixels (eighteen of them at $5), and minifigures? I haven't even mentioned the $8-$12 sets. I don't think it's possible for LEGO to meet your criteria. You should link to some of the older impulse buys which you think were significantly better.

That's not even getting into the little impulse polybags you typically see at checkout counters. You'll find many of Lego's best-selling themes such as Super Heroes, City, Legends of Chima, and Star Wars represented in sets that generally cost less than $5.

[phoenixhawk]

Styrofoam is another term that people use incorrectly. Styrofoam is typically blue and is a house building material. Foam cups ARE NOT Styrofoam. They even say it wrong on TV and movies.

I hear people misuse the term "LEGO" all the time; sometimes I try to correct it, more often not because it is not usually worth a conversation or argument.

[AmazingPharaoh]

I don't care about TLC, only about the legoes they produce. I can buy legoes from any brand, official or not, as long as the pieces are of good quality and are the same ones. Obviously Duplo does not fit since Duplo is not real lego. However Enlighten, Star Diamond, official LEGO, BrickForge, and some MegaBlocks are legoes. They all fit together and are minifig scale. They are all good quality plastic building blocks, look and feel the same, and go well together in one model. I like the official sets, but I wouldn't hesitate picking up a clone set if it's a really good one.

Edited June 11, 2014 by AmazingPharaoh

[8BrickMario]

Technically, DUPLO is LEGO, they're even compatible, and objectively, LEGO refers to the company, not building bricks in general. So knockoff brands are not LEGO and are generally poorer quality in comparison, though mostly for cost reasons. I'd recommend this article here contrasting LEGO and clone brands. Sorry if I seemed rude (I don't want to be at all). It's something I learned about the LEGO community-we're picky about what's called LEGO and what isn't (and how LEGO is referred to as well)!

Edited June 12, 2014 by 8BrickMario

[Faefrost]

Go to Toys R Us or BR there you'll find Kre-o.

And The Barbie Megabloks and Hello Kitty, I have seen them on my way, maybe in the big supermarkets or the bookstore.

The tiny japanese constructionsets are found in some of the bookstores in here Odense.

Are you talking about Microbloks? Those teeny tiny bricks? I think those are Japanese produced. They are made from a softer somewhat less precise ABS than what Lego uses, but they aren't bad for what they are. The sets are well designed and engineered. The parts typically do fit together. They're not Lego compatible and I find them so small as to be painful to assemble.

[8BrickMario]

Nanoblock is essentially the same thing, and I see that in a lot of places here.

[Dorayaki]

Recently, I also heard a little girl call LEGO to a Hello Kitty box set made by Oxford at my local ToyRUs. I guess those cometitor brands (Hasbro, Mattel) would also not want their potential consumers to call their own products LEGO, as long as they're starting to step up their own games.

The LEGO Movie was a good approach for TLC to market products which excatly have the reddish LEGO logo on. The audience would pay more attention to the official LEGO characters. Even if Transformers and Hello Kitty are still popular, kids would get to know "they're no LEGO". Unless the contention over licenses might lead to consumers' confusion (eg, Spongebob is now on MB's hand, but some could mistake them as "an update from LEGO").

I'd like to say there are rare cases like OYO. Those brands don't intend to be copycats, but their limited range of products would have to rely on the "leading brands".

Oh, for Nanoblok, which is a subbrand of Diablok. Most of their designs are very different from LEGO's range. I recently ran into a series of articles talking about their early history. Their early products were also Town-related, but now they only focus on a cuter miniature version of Creator concepts. I quite like their own Hello Kitty products designs which is far from Megabloks or Oxford but also brings a fresh air to the toy market.

Edited June 12, 2014 by Dorayaki