Lego Sales Soar

bricksan

Did any one read the article in todays Guardian with regards to LEGO's recent sales?

link here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/aug/30/lego-sales-toys-uk

yys4u

I'm surprised to see the success of ninjago, I don't really find the sets that interesting at all and many of them don't make sense to me. Only a couple I find well done, and they're usually over priced.

rocao

The article doesn't mention the outsourcing of manufacturing to China, although that may be ok because the author qualifies the statement with "majority". The commentators, however, are mistaken in saying TLG doesn't outsource to China at all.

madforLEGO

Hah 'inexpensive' minifigures is a relative term I guess....

PerryMakes

Ninjago definitely has a target market and one thing's for sure ... it's not the adults :p I, for one, am ecstatic that this theme exists. I can safely pass by Ninjago (and the now defunct Ben 10) and not require EVERY LAST OUNCE OF WILLPOWER to put the entire theme in the cart! They do have a couple dragon's that are pretty bad @$$, but that's it for me.

TalasAntares

^^^ yea I agree with you there. Ninjago doesn't appeal to me at all either...much easier for me to put some more Alien Conquest sets into the cart instead!!! lol

Yellowcastle

As I see it, the more success TLG has, even with younger themes, the more opportunities we get for sets like MMV and the Imperial Flagship.

TalasAntares

^^absolutely. The more the merrier. Success in any one theme equates to success for Lego which is good for all of us AFOLs!

macmon

Well, I like Ninjago earth dragon and the fortress of Garmadon. Since I can use it for halloween theme.

MinifigsMe

^ I only have polys for ninjago, not impressed, but I can see the appeal for kids - but that does look like a good halloween set, though in the end I've gone with Vladek's fortress. http://www.brickset.com/detail/?Set=8877-1

Si_UKNZ

Again no mention of AFOLs contribution to TLGs success. I wonder if it's really as great as we'd like to think.

(PS, @TalasAntares, the ^ means that you're replying to the one above ^^ the one above that, etc ... not sure if you didnt realise this)

richo

I think AFOL contribution will be reasonable, but also very much set dependant. I can see something like MMV, Diagon Alley or Death Star doing very well, but something like the latest Super Star Destroyer I am unsure about based on pushing the price point out.

bluemoose

^^ I've seen recent figures between 5% & 12% for the AFOL 'contribution', although it hasn't been clear whether this is 'number of sets sold to', or 'income from', or 'profit from', or something else entirely. I've got no idea how LEGO came up with these figures or how reliable they are (I don't know how they'd even go about gathering the information ...). I'm pretty sure that even at 12% it is very small change compared to the other main buyer groups ('parents', 'grand parents', etc.).

I wouldn't get too fussed about it ... if you're expecting LEGO (or any other large company) to be grateful for your business, you're only ever going to be disappointed ;-)

dougts

there's likely not much way they can accurately track it. i go in and buy sets at a variety of outlets. they have no way of knowing if I'm buying it for me as an AFOL, for my kids, or for resale (I buy for all 3 of course).

bluemoose

^ exactly.

Silber334

Regardless of "who's" buying the Legos, I sometimes wonder if the crappy video game sales can attribute to the Lego sales increase. Remember how they lost a great deal of profit in the 90s, thanks to them?

Si_UKNZ

^ I think Lego had 2 or 3 titles in the top 10 playstation games recently IIR. Cant do any harm.
^^^ They could if they wanted to (its part of what I do for a living) .. maybe not through sales figures but there are tons of other ways of modelling market behaviours.

MinifigsMe

^ got to admit to loving the PoTC game and it finally pushing me into getting some sets...I reckon it must have a strong effect on people wanting the bricks to match the game. I know a lot of adults have the games, but have yet to enter the AFOL world.

And, is it just me, or have the sets that have increased/kept their value the ones associated with games - Batman, HP, Indiana Jones...I reckon the long term playability of the games means people want the sets long after they're discontinued. (I know there's other factors too, such as the themes being good in the first place...but might be why normal, non obsessives chase and pay high prices for these sets...)

Redbullgivesuwind

@Silber334 The games have done really well. BAtman, Star Wars, PoC and Indian Jones all did really well as did the Star Wars on the PS2 before that since they have passed their games on they make up alot of the sales. I dont think we will be seeing anything along the terrible lines of Rock Raiders again. Thank God.

So do these sales mean they will lower the price :-DDDDDDDDD

Silber334

My bad. I thought the vg industry was quite a predator to Lego. I did know that Lego released some games to join the bandwagon. But I did NOT know that it attributed to quite a lot of sales :P
Ah well.

Si_UKNZ

^ Currently they have games at #3 and #83 in the UK games chart
http://hmv.com/hmvweb/navigate.do?pPageID=4893

prof1515

"Brazer said Lego had not been as affected as rivals by rising manufacturing costs in the far east as it produces less in the region. The company makes the majority of its products in its native Denmark as well as the Czech Republic, Hungary and Mexico."

I find this statement to be disingenous. While manufacturing costs might actually be rising in the far east, they are still considerably lower than they are elsewhere in the world. The fact that Lego's prices continue to rise over time even as they shift more and more of their production to countries with cheap labor would seem to be the reason for the rise in profits. Competitors who have long relied on cheaper far east production might see increased costs but Lego is definitely saving money and increasing profits by turning to cheaper production, not saving money by not.

sonsofsceva

The Ninjago theme has great appeal to children not only because it is ninjas, which almost all boys resonate with, but also because it has the card and spinner game. As AFOLs we may not quite see the appeal, but some of us remember Magic: The Gathering, or think of the crazy success of Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh as trading card games for children, or even closer in spirit to Ninjago - Bakugan. Between this theme and the CFMs, which children typically just grab randomly, there is a huge market among young boys with a few dollars (and while it is three bucks a minifig, that is half the cost of any other action figure these days).