MAB

Lego know that in the past six months, 49 Orthanc sets have sold on bricklink, worldwide, used and new. They also know that there are 49 left in asellers' stock listed on BL. With those tiny numbers, I doubt they'd consider stock of the old one when deciding to produce a new one. They clearly didn't with The Shire.

The bigger studded wheels got a lot of use in my designs, as windmills and for furbine type structures that other brand small figures had to get past, back when we mixed different toys together.

Maybe for the Modulars. I still think there should do a public convenience GWP to go with the modulars. They do enough toilets in private spaces now, so those in the street need somewhere to go.

That sounds fun. Where is this park full of squirrels? :-) VR seemed too much of a gimmick. I had a go on a decent headset. It was fun but not particularly useful for about five minutes after which time I never thought about using it again.

I grew up with these two different style wheels and variants in style and size that are now well outside the 50 years old. These got a lot of use. Obviously there is a lot more choice these days but these vintage ones still keep a place in my heart.

That is presumably because City and Friends are aimed entirely at children and there are no adult sets. Similarly sets in licensed themes aimed at children tend to be playsets, whereas the ones aimed at adults in the same theme tend to focus more on display than play.

If these consumers had no time to view the sets, and the pre-release was during the working day (it was at the same time worldwide so someone somewhere would be working) when they were at work, then how could they have seen the advert and been evilly manipulated to by it forcing them to buy the sets without thinking? The sets are not released yet. They will be on shelves in a month and will presumably be available for at least a year, along with other sets in future. These consumers have not missed anything except for the GWP and there is a possibility that will be back for the store release. The advert is a bit of fun. It is not evil manipulation.

Is that really any different to unlicensed sets? I think this is more down to the builder than the theme. A kid that keeps their Star Wars sets built is likely to keep their Dreamzzz or Ninjago sets built. Whereas a kid that mixes up all the bricks from their unlicensed sets is probably going to mix up their licensed sets too. And linking it to costs of the nobby, it is far better to keep sets together if they think they will want to sell it to help buy different sets in future than to mix it all up. The other big difference now and decades ago is the amount of toys kids have. When I was a kid we had a limited amount of bricks and if I wanted to build, I had to take things apart. Whereas now, kids appear to have a lot more. Obviously that may be personal circumstances but I get the impression it was and is similar to other families.

I know of cases both ways, where some people have bought one set due to the license and that remains the only set they have bought whereas others bought the first set, then another from another theme and another... One woman I know bought the first Friends set (the TV show, not LEGO theme) and has gone on to buy probably 50 sets since so is doing about one a month. Not just licensed sets either, she has all sorts and really seems into botanicals now. And she was amazed when I showed her it was possible to build other things without following instructions at all or just vary them a little to make them look more unique! Are they doing that for enjoyment though or clicks and advertising revenue? Rushing and making mistakes goes hand in hand with the need to be the first if they are monetising the videos.

While they might not need a new parts budget, a brick built Smaug would need a lot of parts. So both ways, it would be expensive.

LEGO has changed a lot since COVID and really it started before that, about 2015 (The LEGO Movie time). Adults started to get more involved and so adult LEGO took off. Before that it was often a 'dirty secret' that some adults bought LEGO for themselves but it has become mainstream and legitimate now. There are a lot of "thing" sets and I guess that goes hand in hand with the rise of adult fans wanting display pieces. It is not 50% but they are popular. As to whether people ask for them, absolutely! The Polaroid camera, the typewriter, ship in a bottle, grand piano, etc have all come through IDEAS so at least 10000 people asked for them, and then they were bought in the 10,000s by consumers. When will it wear off? Who knows! Part of LEGO's strategy is to market to new groups of people rather than just long term LEGO fans, so maybe people aren't getting sick of shelling out large sums for LEGO as they don't do it very often.

They do a second chance at a first impression, as when they are ready to release mini-hubs or whatever then they'll call them something different. And with new branding, it's a new chance for a first impression. I doubt mini-hubs are that far off, but only if there is a market for them. When you look at the size of some of the nano boards available now (and in fact for many years already) they are not all that much bigger. The real issue is the size of the battery, especially if it is going to drive motors.

I went with a £50 order to get free postage and to get the parts I want now, then I'll place a bigger order once there is a decent GWP. If bricklink prices remain high, I might even sell half the stuff I want when it arrives and buy again in future with a GWP.

These are fans that have lived with the "Gotta catch 'em all" slogan of the franchise they follow. I think the advert taps into the nostalgia quite well, showing some adults remembering what they used to be like in days gone by, and modifies the slogan slightly to put it into LEGO context. If anyone sees the advert and thinks LEGO is telling them to ditch all their adult responsibilities and that they should neglect everything else in their lives, then they probably have some serious issues.

I don't see the problem with the advert. Directly targeting the people the sets are aimed at seems sensible to me.

Yeah, I don't think LEGO care they made them before. It was long enough ago that they will do them again if they think they will sell well now. Just like Bag End.

Yeah, I'm sure at one stage they said that they were going to reduce the disparity between different colours but for some pieces it is getting crazy, sometimes 2 or 3 times the price for a different colour.

They aren't available, but The Black Pearl sails are rather expensive. They make The Endurance sails look cheap!

I doubt they will revisit The Hobbit movies.

Yeah, a number of years ago I was able to replace parts of my ZX Spectrum doing the soldering myself as the parts used back then were nice and big. I wouldn't have a hope of doing it on surface mounted parts. Some of them are smaller than the tips I have for my soldering iron!

I'm still hoping they do a yellow brick suit, then black and/or white.

I have enough red & white and red & blue jesters. I wasn't a fan of the orange & purple one, so definitely won't be going for a pink one. They didn't even do a half and half hat to match the body this time.

Declining sales of traditional castle, especially small sets, are probably the reason LEGO wanted to try modernising Castle into Nexo Knights, and now they have seen the real Castle market is adults. ICONS and BDP provide them with great sellers. The two 2014 Castle accessory / battle packs were clearanced here at 50%. I only bought 10 of each as Castle figures just weren't selling well at the time, mainly as I wanted the shields. It is only in recent years that they have become sought after, by adults (or, at least, at adult prices.)

LEGO resellers won't aim for $10 profit parting out a $100 set. $10 is about what it costs in fees to sell that much, assuming it all sells. Most parts sellers aim for a set parting out for at least double what they pay, otherwise it is not worth it. I know as I've been a LEGO reseller for 20 years. 10c a part is not realistic resale value for common parts. It may be the metric used for comparing sets, but is totally unrealistic for resale. Many parts don't sell even when priced at a few cents.

Other people changing their figures to fleshie means they have yellow heads and hands to get rid of. That is good for builders that like yellow skins. I prefer fleshie and regularly trade a bag full of yellow body parts with others that like them.