Is Lego heading for a fall?

LordofLego

I think if you hit a Lego brick with a hammer, it would be fine, or just crack a little, while if you hit the same Mega-B**k, it would shatter.

TheLoneTensor

Aanchir said:

LEGO Group executives have been very insistent that they don't want LEGO to become a general entertainment company, and they intend for toys to remain their core focus.

Lego TV shows, video games, feature films, board games, DTV videos, books, magazines...oh yeah, and toys.

For a group of executives that don't want to become a general entertainment company, they sure are engaged in a lot of general entertainment.

TheLoneTensor

LordofLego said:

I think if you hit a Lego brick with a hammer, it would be fine, or just crack a little.

No.

Aanchir

TheLoneTensor said:

Aanchir said:

LEGO Group executives have been very insistent that they don't want LEGO to become a general entertainment company, and they intend for toys to remain their core focus.

Lego TV shows, video games, feature films, board games, DTV videos, books, magazines...oh yeah, and toys.

For a group of executives that don't want to become a general entertainment company, they sure are engaged in a lot of general entertainment.

But most of that stuff is licensed out to external partners, not produced in-house. Contrast with Hasbro, which has an entire "Hasbro Studios" division responsible for producing TV shows and movies for brands like My Little Pony and Transformers.

Part of the LEGO Group's financial recovery in the naughts involved divesting themselves of things like the LEGOLAND parks, LEGO video games, etc. And meanwhile, things like books have pretty much always been published by external partners like Dorling Kindersley and Scholastic.

CCC

The recent Channel 4 documentary seemed to suggest that Lego played quite a significant role in the development of Lego Movie.

In the UK, they seem to be doing at least 3-4 monthly comics now too. I don't know how much involvement they have there. But they are obviously money makers.

LordofLego

TheLoneTensor said:

LordofLego said:

I think if you hit a Lego brick with a hammer, it would be fine, or just crack a little.

No.

No, no, I don't actually think that's a good idea, I just think that's what would happen. 



Or by "No", do you mean, "That is not what happens when you hit Lego with a hammer"?

TheLoneTensor

Both actually.  If you swing a regular hammer with the normal force at which one would swing a hammer to do its intended job (drive a nail), no Lego piece would be "fine" in any way afterwards.

binaryeye

Aanchir said:

But most of that stuff is licensed out to external partners, not produced in-house.

Does that matter, though? They're investing resources in expanding their brand beyond physical toys. Whether or not they produce it themselves seems irrelevant if they are responsible for setting it in motion.

VorpalRyu

When I first heard Lego had acquired the IP for Angry Birds, I thought the individual had got the story wrong & they meant MegaBloks... That made me think back to this thread. From everything I've heard, Minecraft hasn't been the tear away success TLG was probably expecting, to go after Angry Birds on the back of that... It does make me a little wary.

SithLord196

Yeah, the Angry Birds license kind of makes me take a step back here. It feels like they're starting to stretch themselves a little thin. 

CCC

^^ Really? The first Minecraft set was huge, and the minifig based ones seem to sell well on the secondary market and so do the minifigs, so presumably they have sold at retail too.

novicebuilder101

SithLord196 said:

Yeah, the Angry Birds license kind of makes me take a step back here. It feels like they're starting to stretch themselves a little thin. 

Lego survived Prince of Persia and gasp, Lone Ranger. I think that Angry Birds is actually a step up and will appeal to kids. I'm imagining that they will incorporate lots of play features like an upgraded super jumper so that the birds can smash into bricks.

SithLord196

novicebuilder101 said:

SithLord196 said:

Yeah, the Angry Birds license kind of makes me take a step back here. It feels like they're starting to stretch themselves a little thin. 

Lego survived Prince of Persia and gasp, Lone Ranger. I think that Angry Birds is actually a step up and will appeal to kids. I'm imagining that they will incorporate lots of play features like an upgraded super jumper so that the birds can smash into bricks.

That's a fair point, but it also felt to me like set design was a little better back then compared to some of the stuff we get now. Regardless we'll see how it turns out. The sets could be great but I'm not entirely certain they'll sell well, even with the movie coming out.

Fauch

my first set after dark age was a lone ranger one. red harrington was quite a draw.

LordofLego

TheLoneTensor said:

Both actually.  If you swing a regular hammer with the normal force at which one would swing a hammer to do its intended job (drive a nail), no Lego piece would be "fine" in any way afterwards.

I wasn't thinking you'd swing it that hard. I was thing more along the lines of about half that. Put it this way: if you tapped a Lego brick and a mega-bl*k with a hammer gently and repeated it at slightly increasing force, the mega-bl*k would break first, at which point you stop the experiment and save the Lego brick.

cheshirecat

binaryeye said:

Aanchir said:

But most of that stuff is licensed out to external partners, not produced in-house.

Does that matter, though? They're investing resources in expanding their brand beyond physical toys. Whether or not they produce it themselves seems irrelevant if they are responsible for setting it in motion.

This, LEGO is becoming too encompassing. And whilst licencing out limits their economic vulnerability it doesn't prevent brand fatigue. Of course, for some they don't care and the more LEGO logos they see the better - see iSheep - but seemingly not me.

Xefan

novicebuilder101 said:

SithLord196 said:

Yeah, the Angry Birds license kind of makes me take a step back here. It feels like they're starting to stretch themselves a little thin. 

Lego survived Prince of Persia and gasp, Lone Ranger. I think that Angry Birds is actually a step up and will appeal to kids. I'm imagining that they will incorporate lots of play features like an upgraded super jumper so that the birds can smash into bricks.

I actually thought The Lone Ranger sets they made were some of the nicest of recent years. The fact the film flopped didn't as far as I'm aware stop the sets from selling well - I believe they shifted as well as most typical themes. If nothing else they didn't have to go into sale anywhere near as quickly as say, The Hobbit sets did for example, and when they did they seemed to be snapped up much quicker.

Angry Birds has the opposite problem, a popular IP, but will the sets be any good? Minecraft has done well as a popular IP even though many of the sets are awful (honestly, The Mine falls apart as soon as you look at it), but can Angry Birds do the same? It'll be interesting to see.

The biggest problem I see with Angry Birds is the brand doesn't really have any class, it's a brand that's sold itself downriver to over the top commercialisation and terrible levels of tackyness. I'm concerned that Lego, typically seen as a premium brand, is associating itself with one of the biggest, cheapest, and tackiest whores of the land. If Lego is similarly willing to associate with any brand that comes along it's going to risk similarly looking like a tacky non-premium brand with less value associated with it. At that point people will want to know why they're being charged premium prices for Angry Birds style tat.

Fauch

Xefan said:

(honestly, The Mine falls apart as soon as you look at it), but can Angry Birds do the same?

I guess that would be the point lol.

far west theme is nice, too bad there are so few sets. in 20 years we've had only 5 buildings in 3 sets to make a town (1 more set if you count toy story)

the lone ranger has nice sets, but gives you only 2 building, 1 type of tipi, and I think like 3 different indians, and any attempt to make a village will result in a clone army.

TheLoneTensor

LordofLego said:

TheLoneTensor said:

Both actually.  If you swing a regular hammer with the normal force at which one would swing a hammer to do its intended job (drive a nail), no Lego piece would be "fine" in any way afterwards.

I wasn't thinking you'd swing it that hard. I was thing more along the lines of about half that. Put it this way: if you tapped a Lego brick and a mega-bl*k with a hammer gently and repeated it at slightly increasing force, the mega-bl*k would break first, at which point you stop the experiment and save the Lego brick.

Oooook.  So let's run with that scenario.  If you are in that experiment, and you are parallel as you ratchet up the force for each brick strike.  At the point you "break" the MB brick, we're assuming that you're also hitting with the Lego brick with the same force that just broke the MB brick.  If so, the Lego brick may not be "destroyed" at that point, but it will certainly be damaged enough to not be usable anymore.

What's say instead we just agree that a MB brick is of lesser quality than a Lego brick and be done with it.

CCC

I don't really play with them, but I found some megabloks were softer feeling than Lego. That may mean they are slightly more elastic. In that case they may deform easier than cracking. Whereas Lego will crack, some parts very easily. Cheese slopes.

TheLoneTensor

I think this calls for a practical hammer test.

plasmodium

TheLoneTensor said:

I think this calls for a practical hammer test.

Stop! Hammer time!

prevere

SithLord196 said:

Yeah, the Angry Birds license kind of makes me take a step back here. It feels like they're starting to stretch themselves a little thin. 

If LEGO does Angry Birds like this, I have no problems with it.

Shib

@prevere - The problem is that you now have to throw them at pigs! :-O

CCC

So it can already be done ...

LordofLego

@TheLoneTensor What's say instead we just agree that a MB brick is of lesser quality than a Lego brick and be done with it.

That's what I meant in the first place, but you took it literally.

Fauch

wow, those eyebrows are just spot on XD

TheLoneTensor

LordofLego said:

@TheLoneTensor What's say instead we just agree that a MB brick is of lesser quality than a Lego brick and be done with it.

That's what I meant in the first place, but you took it literally.

I still want the experiment.  Let us know how that goes.

Fauch

maybe the hammer breaks first

Galactus

Can you smash an MB brick to smithereens with a hammer made from LEGO bricks?  ;)

Interesting experiments, but I'm afraid it won't say much about the fall LEGO is/isn't heading for. I think it's the latter by the way. 

davee123

FWIW, I saw a YouTube video some years ago that demonstrated the hammer test.  Looked like a high school kid doing the experiment.  I think he framed it as something like "how many hits with a hammer will it take to destroy a 2x4 brick?"

First up was LEGO.  He placed a 2x4 brick on the floor (I think it was actually carpeted floor, which was probably not all that great for experimental reasons), and hit it with a hammer.  After one hit, the 2x4 was a little deformed.  It was probably still usable for certain purposes, but it was clearly deformed.

He hit it again, and the deformation increased.  After about ... maybe 5 or 6 hits, the brick started falling apart, and looked like a blob of its former self, with some parts hanging off or maybe even actually separating off the brick.

Next up: Mega Bloks.  He did the same thing, this time taking out a 2x4 Mega Blok.  With the initial strike, the Mega Blok basically shattered into many small shards of plastic.

From what I understand, this is very intentional on LEGO's part-- they don't want pieces that "shatter" into small slivers of sharp plastic that could be harmful to children.  They want bricks that "moosh" when they're hit, since many children are pretty violent with their toys.  Even though they're not meant to be played with that way, LEGO still wants to keep kids safe.

And now for a tangent with a similar example:  LEGO storage tubs.  LEGO made storage bins for LEGO.  They were supposed to just be boxes to put LEGO in-- no big deal.  But kids were using them as step stools to stand on!  LEGO didn't intend for that to happen, that's just inherently what kids DO with sturdy-looking boxes.

So LEGO decided to reinforce the tubs so that they could handle some more substantial weight.  They didn't WANT kids to stand on the tubs, but they made them safe enough so that kids COULD.

Anyway, moral of the story: LEGO really does try to make a high quality product (though there are still problems, of course).

DaveE

LordofLego

davee123 said:

FWIW, I saw a YouTube video some years ago that demonstrated the hammer test.  Looked like a high school kid doing the experiment.  I think he framed it as something like "how many hits with a hammer will it take to destroy a 2x4 brick?"

First up was LEGO.  He placed a 2x4 brick on the floor (I think it was actually carpeted floor, which was probably not all that great for experimental reasons), and hit it with a hammer.  After one hit, the 2x4 was a little deformed.  It was probably still usable for certain purposes, but it was clearly deformed.

He hit it again, and the deformation increased.  After about ... maybe 5 or 6 hits, the brick started falling apart, and looked like a blob of its former self, with some parts hanging off or maybe even actually separating off the brick.

Next up: Mega Bloks.  He did the same thing, this time taking out a 2x4 Mega Blok.  With the initial strike, the Mega Blok basically shattered into many small shards of plastic.

From what I understand, this is very intentional on LEGO's part-- they don't want pieces that "shatter" into small slivers of sharp plastic that could be harmful to children.  They want bricks that "moosh" when they're hit, since many children are pretty violent with their toys.  Even though they're not meant to be played with that way, LEGO still wants to keep kids safe.

And now for a tangent with a similar example:  LEGO storage tubs.  LEGO made storage bins for LEGO.  They were supposed to just be boxes to put LEGO in-- no big deal.  But kids were using them as step stools to stand on!  LEGO didn't intend for that to happen, that's just inherently what kids DO with sturdy-looking boxes.

So LEGO decided to reinforce the tubs so that they could handle some more substantial weight.  They didn't WANT kids to stand on the tubs, but they made them safe enough so that kids COULD.

Anyway, moral of the story: LEGO really does try to make a high quality product (though there are still problems, of course).

DaveE

Thank you. The issue is resolved!

Now I don't have to do it and feel guilty the rest of my life.

ZooMotorPool

Visited LEGO Shop ID, Cilandak, Jakarta today.

Massive queue on new LEGO expert creator 2015 release. So I passed on that new stuffs. But, I still have to wait for 1 hour to get the non-queueing themes (City, Movies, Superheroes, Friends, etc). Turns out that people in this third world are spending enormous amount of money for massive LEGO collections. The person in front of me bought the new 75060 Star Wars Slave I (2015) at IDR 3 million. The person behind me? the 42030 Volvo L350F Wheel Loader at IDR 4 million. They all paid the premium price, and they still hoard other smaller packages on top of that.

So, is LEGO heading for a downfall? Hardly. They have been opening for 2 years already, and still the local excitement very high. It is very rare for expensive stuffs like LEGO to do so well in this market.