MAB

Don't expect them to be there when it comes back up. During the downtime, they usually (based on last year) go through and pull lots of licensed parts that should not have been sold in the first place. They would have noticed that thousands of them have been sold by now. You might be better off buying them now while they are cheap and people are taking a quick but smallish profit expecting them to be sold via BAP again. If they are not available when the site does come up, the prices will rise.

Yes, that is the difference between having a smart HQ for important visitors and a call centre.

"The LEGO Group have never done sets based on food before." Yes they have. It's jokes and rubbish ideas like this that need culling. Anything that doesn't get 100 in the first month should be removed to declutter the site. I guess the problem here is, if you don't believe in the project enough to (or cannot be bothered to) promote it, then why should it get any more passive attention than any other project submitted to the site? How would the website know of the projects merits more than any other project? They can highlight fast risers (but for this you need to get initial votes), staff picks (but this needs knowledgable staff intervention, etc), but if the submitter is not going to do any work to promote the project, which is part of the process, then why should they get rewarded?

Yours were on there way over the Christmas holidays, so are probably delayed.

They removed Green Lantern parts being for sale while it was still up. Normally when they do that they don't come back.

Our local stores had trouble keeping them (S14) in stock before Halloween. I asked the WHSmiths manager about them (I wanted to use a £5 off £20 and had a gift card from there) and he reckoned they were late getting their full allocation. They got odd boxes prior to Halloween which sold quickly, then got loads at the start of November which didn't sell too well.

I'll raise you countless Brickmaster sets, Target minifig cubes and the entire run of Master Builder Academy that were available in USA / North America but not elsewhere. Of course, we had Batman, LOTR, SW games too (in Europe). It pays to have friends on the other side of the Atlantic.

Most buyers will be opening it any way, unless you are targeting adult collectors only.

It could be back any time, presumably when they are less busy. The Green Lantern (complete) parts have been available for six months, but finally got pulled in December. You cannot currently buy, you can only order replacements for missing / damaged parts.

I sell on both BL and eBay. I tend to price eBay sales about 33-50% higher than on BL, at least at the start. The fees are higher there, buyer fraud is more common and (some) people don't care about price so much. You don't have to price to appeal to everyone, just the top end.

The other problem with the pattern on that brick is what happens when you stagger them. It doesn't look as good as when they are just stacked, but obviously less strength for large walls if you do this.

Did exosuit put energy back into classic space? Lego had so many left over, it might have killed any ideas for a comeback completely. The same could happen to anything castle. Kids are moving on fast these days. It's the adults that want more of the same.

As noted above, the delay in some locations may be due to the football ones in Europe needing to be squeezed in over summer although this presumably would have a knock on effect on the spring release too and also doesn't explain other countries such as Singapore getting them on time.

Although £250 may be a lot for some, it is not that big a deal to quite a few people. Some collectors can buy it all (if they want it). Lego don't expect everyone to buy it and in fact did a lot a favour by putting the main cast into cheap sets (here CMF).

^ we've had proper bricks / plates in a bag - Smithers, Holiday elf, Team GB gymnast, etc.

Getting sharks to put on eBay, no doubt!

Nothing is pretty clear when it comes to Lego plans.

Not really, just different sales strategies for different parts of the world. They are released already. The initial release date was 1 Jan (Europe). This is why people need to put locations when they post info from S@H or Lego stores.

Probably distribution issues, or marketing strategy holding back to try to clear other items while people have gift cards to use. Different release dates for sets are not uncommon. Similarly end dates too.

UK brand stores are selling them.

They haven't pushed the release date back. They are available in store in UK Lego stores.

And like Panini stickers they will include some players that won't play and leave out others that will. I wonder if they managed to get agreement with the English FA to use the England badge and kit design. Something Panini has not been able to do for quite a while now.

And also if Lego decided to do a follow up to a first set that they designed, I cannot see them paying a third party for the idea. If you want to make money off this, sell the instructions. If you want others to be able to make them, give them away for free.

It was available for at least 10 days, along with tons of other SW and SH pieces. They screwed up again although not quite as bad as when they did Ghostbusters torsos for free.

It would be a great way to make money. If they did a series of generic collectable minidolls I reckon it would sell just as well as a regular set of minifigs. If they did Disney minidolls series, it would sell as well as Disney CMFs. Minidolls are popular with kids, especially girls. Just because older mainly purist adult collectors don't like them, it doesn't mean they wouldn't sell.