rzetlin

Over my 25+ years of collecting Lego I have few tips: Get the small sets: Looking back my collection, the majority of them are very small sets. If you spend all your money on a large set, you find yourself having no money to buy more Lego later on. Get sets that you can use in MOCS: It great that you assembled that X-Wing, but it very unlikely you will take it apart to use for something else. Organize your Lego: If you only a few bricks you can throw everything in one bin. But once your Lego collection grows, I recommend organizing your bricks into plastic boxes. It makes it easier to find the piece you are looking for. I recommend getting a few of these sets to quickly expand your collection: LEGO Bricks & More Builders of Tomorrow

I love Lego's Star Wars army packs because they are the least inexpensive way to build up your own clone army, Unfortunately the vehicles included with the minifigures are substandard because they are too small to carry your army into battle. What are the best Lego Stars vehicle sets to get to help build up the army?

Looks like Mega Bloks may not be the golden goose for Mattel after all: Mega Brands reports lower Q4 net earnings of $1.4M

As a cartoon series and characters as a whole, the Mixels does not interest me. The characters are too goofy and Juvenile for me. I do like the ball and joint pieces and the low price point which I can see myself buying Mixel sets to use in MOCs.

It's been a long time since I started to build my own lego town. I have a lot of bricks, but not a lot of doors or windows. I have been thinking about getting the creator sets or maybe the lego city sets. I am not sure which is the least expensive sets to get to start up my lego town.

I recently picked up the Republic Striker-class Starfighter at Indigo.

Lego finally did it: Lego Is The Biggest Toy Company In The World

Sorry, I used the wrong company name, but the link and stats I provided are correct. Mattel Reports Fourth Quarter and Full Year 2013 Financial Results.

I don't use stickers. Stickers peel off over time and they don't look well with custom MOCs.

I am mostly into the Star Wars, Space, Ninjago, Superheroes and Creator Sets. I am just saying thank you.

To understand what is happen we have to look at Hasbro and Lego 2013 Annual Report: Mattel 2013 Results: Worldwide net sales up 1% from the prior year; North American gross sales down 2% and International gross sales up 5% Worldwide gross sales for core brands: Barbie down 6%; Hot Wheels down 4%; Fisher-Price down 6%; and American Girl up 11%; On a regional basis, full year gross sales were down 2% in the North American Region, with no impact from changes in currency exchange rates. For the International Region, gross sales were up 5% Lego 2013 Results: Revenue for the first half of 2013 was DKK 10,363m compared with DKK 9,134m for the same period last year – an increase of 13% In local currency (i.e. excluding the impact of foreign exchange changes) revenue increased 15% year over year. The LEGO Group increased its share of the global toy market to approximately 8.8 % – up from 8.6% at the end of 2012 Sales to consumers rose by 8 % in European markets and by 4% in North and Latin America. The strongest performance was experienced in Asia with growth in consumer sales of over 35% for the first half of 2013 Top selling lines: City, Star Wars, Duplo, Friend and Chima. DUPLO, Technic and Creator experience high growth rates in 2013 Just glancing at the numbers Lego is doing well better off than Hasbro in terms of growth. (Hasbro 1% growth vs. Lego 13% growth) Mattel have the problem that its traditional brand toys are not selling well at all. Not surprising Hasbro had to do something to boast its sales or else its shareholders would questioning the board of directors direction. Mattel is hoping to boast its sales by $405 million.

This video explains what is happening with the toy market: Mattel and Hasbro sales have been flat, Lego sales on the other hand have taken off like a rocket. Mattel saw that Lego is making billion of dollars on bricks and The Lego Movie. I see Mattel's purchase of Mega Bloks as a knee-jerk reaction to Lego's success. Is Mattel a threat to Lego? You don't see Hasbro's Kre-O line hurting Lego's bottom line, so I do not believe that Mattel Mega Bloks will destroy Lego.

You are welcome.

Mattel buying Mega Bloks may not lead to more Mega Bloks success. I remember Mattel acquired a Canadian children software company name SoftKey for $3.6 billion dollars. Due to mismanagement, SoftKey was run into the ground with $82.4 million loss. Mattel is a toy company, but not a brick company like Lego. The last few years Mattel’s sales are not strong. The purchase of Mega Bloks is a strategic move to increase Mattel’s profits. Mattel may not push Mega Bloks to complete head-to-head with Lego. Only time will tell on what Mattel will do with Mega Bloks. I will continue to support Lego to ensure the Lego Movie 2 isn’t called “The Battle of the Mega Blok Overloads”.

Greetings. I have been lurking on these forums for a few years, but today I decided to become a forum member. For over a decade I have purchased a few Lego sets here and there, but never really got into Lego until the last few years. I decided to become a full fledged AFOL and show my appreciation to this creative brick. I hope I can contribute to these forums.