Forecasting retail sales for summer/fall (US)

prevere

I only bring this topic up because last year I made a big order in the summer time, right about 2 weeks before the TRU marathon of sales started.

I'm thinking a big sale might be needed soon to make room in the warehouses for LOTR, new SW, MF, etc.

lulwut

So which sets currently sitting on shelves should go? Because of limited space, some Walmarts didn't even get a shot at the Avengers sets.

Brickarmor

TRU near me still has Atlantis stuff, and a lot of it. I asked the manager when he was going to mark it down to make room for the summer stuff, and he acted like I just asked directions to Timbuktu. I know "mark down" is a tough concept for them, but jeez. You can bet I'll be watching very closely over the next 6-8 weeks. I wonder which themes will now be inexplicably exempt from the BOGO half off sales. They also still have PotC, AC, and HP. So, oddly, I can't wait for the new summer sets!!!... to knock down the price of old sets.

jadedanc

Same here, my TRU has alot of AC, just restocked HP, PotC, lots of Cars, Toy Story too. They just marked down some of the POP & PQ finally but not real good markdowns yet.

llanowarsoldier

I think all the Harbor and City Space stuff will go. Also any SW set that didn't come out this year(non-exclusives) will be gone also to make room for the new sets. As for MF and LotR sets I think they will just work their way onto shelves.

Coolsplash

Whats the current retail on POTC Queen Anne's set??? Is it available easily enough???

BrickDancer

^Still $119.99 USD and widely available.

zjygkmatt

I work in retail, and they suck when it comes to sales. They don't ever want to put anything on sale if they don't have to. Or inform a customer if a sale is coming up, which is why to the OP, the manager acted in that way.

AFFOL_Shellz_Bellz

Our Walmart has a lot of Atlantis sets and not a single Friends set to be found!

josecafe

Friends sets are usually in the girls toy aisle.

Odindusk

My Walmart has been... odd about LEGO the past year or so. They have tons of PotC, AC, and even some Atlantis still. They seem to have bought a billion cases of series #5 minifigs because there's many boxes sitting around still.

Because of this, they act like no one wants LEGO anymore. They haven't ordered series #6 or #7, no Superheroes stuff, etc. I guess until they sell out of their old, unpopular stock, they won't be inclined to freshen up their LEGO offerings.

prevere

Can each Walmart select their own stock from Lego? I'd think it'd be a corporate decision, given the company.

Brickarmor

I would think they have some kind of selection, probably based on an area's median income, employment statistics, etc. But maybe not, and maybe on some backwoods WalMart aisle there are mountains of modulars on eternal clearance... It would seem pretty rudimentary to me, though, to say that certain objects are Category A and only go to Category A stores (with high socioeconomic indicators), and so forth.