LEGO announces product variation pilot

Brickset.com

Following their accidental unveiling during August, LEGO has officially revealed five new sets which are variations on existing models.

These five products comprise a pilot scheme, assessing how customers respond to various colours and versions of each model, with their performance at different retailers.

Unfortunately, availability of these sets will be limited to the UK, which has been chosen as a representative market. The models have been released today and will be available until the 30th of November, or while stocks last.

View official images and more information about the pilot scheme after the break...

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Source: https://brickset.com/article/63409

Chris87

I see already people have them on eBay at twice the price. If any way to help out someone who genuinely wants one then will see if I can since I am UK based

Yellowcastle

I think this is interesting but whoa is it going to create havoc with the secondary market.

Bumblepants

I just want to buy light royal blue parts on Bricks and Pieces

daewoo

The inclusion of two City Fire sets, with very few changes (mostly to make the vehicles match the most recent colors), is an odd choice for TLG to make.  There are a plethora of City sets that would better fit the idea than Fire....unless TLG were going to really shake it up and have the fire vehicles in radically different colors than red...but of course they didn't do that.  

Bumblepants

daewoo said:

The inclusion of two City Fire sets, with very few changes (mostly to make the vehicles match the most recent colors), is an odd choice for TLG to make.  There are a plethora of City sets that would better fit the idea than Fire....unless TLG were going to really shake it up and have the fire vehicles in radically different colors than red...but of course they didn't do that.  

Yeah I feel like the kids/parents in the market for City Fire are going to buy whatever Lego fire station is out there and have no idea if it is a remake or recolor. What data is to be gleaned from that exactly? The dinos and Fiat make sense though.

stlux

The Fire sets might be about filling certain price points in the range. The "new" #77943 and #77944 are smaller/larger than 2019's #60215 Fire Station.

And/or: with the target audience for Fire sets constantly being refreshed because of 6-8 year olds ageing out, these sets might be the ones where a simple refresh/minor update/merging multiple small sets in a larger one will still appear "fresh" to the target audience.

The_Rancor

As long as they don’t do it with X-Wings I’ll be fine!

bricktuary

Christmas X-Wing is the best non-mainstream set in years though! 

Astrobricks

A pilot is an experiment. But in an experiment you try not to change any variables other than the one you are interested in (mostly color in this case?). So why release these as a limited time regional exclusive, thus totally swamping the effect of the color change? 🙄

CaptainRogers

I'm in the US and was able to purchase the Fiat through Zavvi. I've ordered from them 3 or 4 times and never had an issue. In fact my 10% off R2D2 arrived in under a week!

daewoo

stlux said:

The Fire sets might be about filling certain price points in the range. The "new" #77943 and #77944 are smaller/larger than 2019's #60215 Fire Station.

And/or: with the target audience for Fire sets constantly being refreshed because of 6-8 year olds ageing out, these sets might be the ones where a simple refresh/minor update/merging multiple small sets in a larger one will still appear "fresh" to the target audience.

But you can just do that anyway with the regular production of fire stations.  To include it in this "trial to see if the same sets will sell when available in other colors" makes no sense.

Yellowcastle

The_Rancor said:

As long as they don’t do it with X-Wings I’ll be fine!

Don’t they already do this?  White -> Orange -> Blue -> Black

CCC

I imagine the trial will be a great success and all sets will get a wider release next year or soon after. These will be quick flips to people that think they have missed out on a limited edition. 

Astrobricks

CCC said:

I imagine the trial will be a great success and all sets will get a wider release next year or soon after. These will be quick flips to people that think they have missed out on a limited edition. 

According to @CapnRex101, in the comments of this article on the main site, they will not get a wider release.
https://brickset.com/article/63435/why-was-the-uk-chosen-for-the-product-variant-pilot

TheFew

So what are the 5 sets that are going to be piloted?

Astrobricks

TheFew said:

So what are the 5 sets that are going to be piloted?

They are all listed in the article.

TheFew

Astrobricks said:

TheFew said:

So what are the 5 sets that are going to be piloted?

They are all listed in the article.

They may well be... but I can't seem to find them! And I have looked at the link in this thread a few times. Or are they in the comments?

TheFew

Ignore that. You mean the link at the very top! Duh!

CCC

Astrobricks said:

CCC said:

I imagine the trial will be a great success and all sets will get a wider release next year or soon after. These will be quick flips to people that think they have missed out on a limited edition. 

According to @CapnRex101, in the comments of this article on the main site, they will not get a wider release.
https://brickset.com/article/63435/why-was-the-uk-chosen-for-the-product-variant-pilot

Yeah, the comment appeared after I wrote that. Still, I cannot see the fire sets being that popular and worthwhile investing in, the fiat is available pretty much worldwide, so that leaves just the two dino sets.

Astrobricks

TheFew said:

Ignore that. You mean the link at the very top! Duh!

Yes :) 
The forum post is just an automatically generated link to the actual main site article.

Brainslugged

I may have misread, but the article / press release made me think the Fiat wouldn't be available in-store. I can confirm it is though.

DeMontes

Brainslugged said:

I may have misread, but the article / press release made me think the Fiat wouldn't be available in-store. I can confirm it is though.

Yes I picked one up from the Glasgow LEGO Store today too 👍🏼

Yellowcastle

I’m not sure I understand what information they can glean from sales of these new sets.  How many people might simply be buying them because of their limited / unique nature?

madforLEGO

LEGO should know by now that due to popularity of their product that they cannot really release something, that could be determined to be successful, in a pilot or limited quantity as I think the 'limited number' part will mess with any relevant data of true demand due to the product and not the nature of the release.I guess they can also look at sites like eBay and Amazon to see how many are really just being resold vs those who wanted the set for its color change...

Yellowcastle

I’ll be honest, I always liked the set but it wasn’t in my wheelhouse.  When they released the alternate, it’s uniqueness pushed me over the top.

560Heliport

Yellowcastle said:

I’ll be honest, I always liked the set but it wasn’t in my wheelhouse.  When they released the alternate, it’s uniqueness pushed me over the top.

@Yellowcastle you've been over the top for quite some time! :)

CCC

madforLEGO said:

LEGO should know by now that due to popularity of their product that they cannot really release something, that could be determined to be successful, in a pilot or limited quantity as I think the 'limited number' part will mess with any relevant data of true demand due to the product and not the nature of the release.I guess they can also look at sites like eBay and Amazon to see how many are really just being resold vs those who wanted the set for its color change...

Maybe that is why they have done some that are likely to be popular and others that are less so. How many people have loaded up on the limited edition City Fire sets due to their uniqueness or resale value?

Bumblepants

CCC said:

madforLEGO said:

LEGO should know by now that due to popularity of their product that they cannot really release something, that could be determined to be successful, in a pilot or limited quantity as I think the 'limited number' part will mess with any relevant data of true demand due to the product and not the nature of the release.I guess they can also look at sites like eBay and Amazon to see how many are really just being resold vs those who wanted the set for its color change...

Maybe that is why they have done some that are likely to be popular and others that are less so. How many people have loaded up on the limited edition City Fire sets due to their uniqueness or resale value?

Maybe that one guy who bought all the Technic 4x4 Crawler limited edition sets in the UK went back in for round two?