Blog And News Articles

Issue 14 of Blocks Magazine is now with subscribers, and will be in shops on Thursday 19th November. This month we take a journey into the space-time vortex with the Doctor and his TARDIS, featuring an in-depth review of the latest LEGO Ideas set. We also stop off for an exclusive, behind-the-scenes interview on how the Ideas platform really works, including what the review process involves, why larger projects don’t make the cut and much more besides. Elsewhere, we take a look at how LEGO’s spaceship designs have changed over the decades, the most profitable LEGO sets to invest in, how to build a supercar and whether LEGO Dimensions really is worth your…

I happened upon some of the new 2016 battle packs almost an entire week before their street date. I was excited to get a jump on them and to increase my personal armies. REVIEW: SET DETAILS Set #: 75132 Name: First Order Battle Pack Theme: Star Wars Parts: 88 Price: $12.99 Before we get to the build, let’s talk value. At $12.99 the price per piece works out to a bit under $.15 each. This is on the high side of pricing for a licensed set. There are 4 minifigures a First Order Stormtrooper, a First Order Heavy Gunner Stormtrooper, and 2 different First Order Crew. The Heavy Gunner and the open face Crew are currently exclusive to this set. …

I have had the privilege of meeting Dr Dave Watford along with Huw Millington of Brickset fame during several of my work excursions to London. They were always gracious enough to come to take a ride into the city to meet with me when time was available. Not only are these two extremely nice gentleman, it is very evident that they know their LEGO. In all honesty, I would be shocked if you can find something to stump them on. Dr Dave works Huw on Brickset, is a Features Writer with the magazine Bricks and he has his own LEGO blog called Gimme LEGO. Dr Dave's blog articles are always detailed with strong solid points and educational, I highly recommend it. For th…

If Walmart's $139.99 TIE fighter sale wasn't enough, here's an even better discount. Amazon.com has discounted the set by 37% to $125.99 for Prime members. An additional $30 can be saved by using the Amazon Rewards Visa credit card during check-out. Click the link below for more information. https://www.amazon.com/LEGO-Star-75095-Fighter-Building/dp/B00X3301HI/? For more Brickpicker information about this set and more Lego deals, please view the Forum topics below. http://community.brickpicker.com/announcement/24-today-is-amazon-prime-day/ View full blog article

The Lego Group has revealed the first of their 2016 San Diego Comic Con minifigure giveaways: a new "Hydra-devoted" Captain America minifigure! This minifigure celebrates the heel turn of one of Marvel fans' favorite heroes. More information on the giveaway can be found at Entertainment Weekly. What do you think of the new minifigure? Please share your thoughts in the comments. View full blog article

http://metro.co.uk/2017/08/03/lego-recalled-120000-sets-because-one-worker-packed-the-wrong-shade-of-grey-6827254/ Doh! There goes the Christmas bonus..

Good news for Lego Ideas completionists and set 21301 fans, the Birds set is being heavily discounted by Lego store and shop at home web sites. The latest US-based sale seems to be working as shop at home is now sold-out and inventory is drying up at their physical mall stores. This is also a good sign this set is near retirement. I like this set's investment potential compared to most sets since Birds doesn't seem to be heavily hoarded by resellers and the production run seems limited like others in the Ideals theme. While 21301 is not a flashy set, it's a fun build and looks great displayed. The newly discounted price of $35.98 is also an attracti…

So, what is BigBlueDogBricks (Brick Classifieds Store) up to, you ask? Swimming in sales is the answer, and since those sales have resulted in money, I'm swimming in cash flow. Granted it is mostly just numbers in my Paypal account, so the swimming is more metaphorical than anything else, but I'm definitely in a Micheal Phelps kinda place. So, with money coming in from sales and inventory moving pretty much as projected I have some spare capital to reinvest. I believe the time has come for me to start getting to my magic number for 71006 The Simpson's House. Pros: The Simpsons! It is pretty self-explanatory. Regardless of your opinion on the show, the …

Issue 16 of Blocks Magazine is now with subscribers, and will be in shops on Thursday 21st January. Valentine’s Day is on the horizon, and what better way to declare your love than with LEGO? From Valentine’s hearts to brick bouquets, this month’s issue is packed with outside-the-box ideas to make this year’s celebrations a little more special. Elsewhere, we dive into our ‘Build It’ section to show you how to construct your own transforming Optimus Prime model, with step-by-step instructions and a guide to sourcing all the parts you’ll need, and find out how you can recreate long-retired sets without breaking the bank. There’s much more besides, as Danie…

Ok, which one of you did this? Darth_Raichu? Veegs? According to this article, police are reporting that three men forced their way into a Toys 'R' Us in Ontario and stole a "large quantity" of Lego sets with a presumed retail value of $20,000. That is a pretty large haul even if the currency is in Canadian Dollars. I am wondering why this news is just coming out now since the crime happened back in October. The most intriguing part of this article to me is that they mention that this probably happened due to the increase in popularity because of the movie and that the high prices of LEGO have created a "black market" I am not sure if they are callin…

According to this Lego Ideas blog entry, the approved Lego Ideas Adventure Time set is nearly complete! Here's a quick glance at the set: The set will be number 21308, and include 495 bricks with an MSRP of $49.99. Per the blog entry, seven brick built characters will be included in the set: Jake, Princess Bubblegum, Lady Rainicorn, Marceline, BMO, Gunter and Ice King. Compare this to the originally approved Ideas entry: Even though there are fewer characters, the ones in the approved set appear to be slightly more detailed than the original entry. This new set is much different than the Lego Dimensions packs that are set to be released wi…

Star Wars fans love stuff that made short appearances in the films. I remember as a kid how much I enjoyed my Empire Strikes Back AT-ST walker and the adventures my figures went on in the Twin Pod Cloud Car. I also remember my cousin's Darth Vader's TIE Fighter. I couldn't have one because I already had a TIE Fighter. Vader's TIE wasn't as much background as those other 2 examples, but it wasn't a major ship in the movie. It had a few minutes of screen time in a New Hope and then basically never appeared in a film again. It served as the template for the TIE Bomber, but that was hardly the same ship. This was Vader's ship. It wasn't a standard TIE, and what kind of havoc …

"The sky is falling!!" USPS to raise shipping rates as much as 25% Unless you are completely new to the selling side of Lego investing, you have probably heard that the United States Postal Service is increasing shipping rates. There are plenty of articles and news stories documenting why they are doing this, and that is not what this blog entry is for. There are even plenty of news articles that will help the eBay sellers navigate the new fee structure for shipping, a decent summary can be found HERE I had been meaning to make a post about this topic earlier in time for the Christmas rush, but I figured that with this news, it would fit in nicely with our new Bl…

LEGO opened its largest store to date on Wednesday May 11, 2016 at the Shanghai Disney Resort in China. Lego said in a statement the Chinese market was "one of the best performing markets in 2015". Lego is also setting up a factory in China which should be operational in 2017 in Jiaxing, 100 kilometers from Shanghai. Links to Reuter and Baidu for video and pictures from the opening day. View full blog article

Hello, I'd like to tell you about an idea that I had. I'd like to make June 25th Give a Sick Kid a Brick (Break) Day. This would be a day where we can give to a little served cause. It might not even cost you a dime. I don't know how many of you have had a sick kid. My child's been to the emergency room more times than I can remember and admitted to the hospital for observation 3 times. The children's hospital is just as dreary, just as stark and joyless as an adult hospital. Somehow it seems worse because the child doesn't have the same acceptance as an adult in the same position. What an adult endures, a child fights. Shots, procedures, nurses, doctors and speciali…

Vinicius & Tom

Major Update below from the comments sections, looks like the set will contain BB-8, Flametrooper, Poe wearing Finn's jacket (well, it's Finn's jacket now) and a 4th minifigure which might be Max Von Sydow's character Lor San Tekka. It looks like set 75102 "Poe's X-Wing Fighter" will be getting a wingman to help battle First Order Tie Fighters by the Summer of 2016. Lego reviewer and insider Just2Good recently published information on two rumored Lego sets and a X-Wing set is among them. A smaller Jakku-themed set is the other set. My thoughts... We can probably expect a white / light gray with blue them…

So, you've stumbled across brickpicker.com and are overwhelmed by the number of different threads, blogs and sets. First, welcome to this community. Lots of users will happily welcome you, others, maybe no so much. Especially if you populate different threads with a variation on 'what should I buy' or 'is this a good set to invest in'? I'd argue both of these questions (other than gifs and sarcastic rejoinders) form the basis of every single thread, so instead of asking about a particular set, check out the thread dedicated to that set and start at the beginning. I can almost guarantee that some posters like it (some will even give logical reasons why) as an inv…

Thanks to forum member @ravenb99, we have a list of the possible discounts being offered on items at Lego Retail Shops and Online. I only say possible because this year, Lego chose not to send the list out to their affiliates. The list appears to be as one would expect. Take a look. I may have missed an item or two copying items over from the original list found here. Chances are, it's 20% off As we head into the Holiday Season LEGO is excited to be able to promote a few great offers! On November 25th LEGO will be offering Free Shipping on all orders through 11/28! Plus you can shop the Brick Friday Sale featuring select products while supplies last and qualifying…

Note: spoilers are included within this article Season 2.5 Details Lego Rebels fans can tune to Disney (or one of the many mobile device apps) tomorrow evening (Jan. 20) to watch the first of ten new episodes. We have interesting story-lines ahead that will not only please regular viewers but should inject renewed investing focus into this Star Wars Lego sub-theme. All 10 episode titles and synopsis were published online yesterday but has been removed due to possibly being fake (see tweet below) Known Details as of Jan 19 Vader returns and is voiced again by James Earl Jones. A dual between Vader and Ah…

I've built both the A-Wing and Darth Vader's TIE Fighter before. Neither build had previously done a lot to excite me. I remember building 7150 TIE Fighter and Y-Wing back in 1999. That particular build colored my perception of Star Wars LEGO for the next decade and change. I also built 8017 Darth Vader's TIE Fighter which was miles better and 75003 A-Wing Starfighter. None of them really excited me enough to keep. I wish I had held onto them in order to compare and contrast, but that's the breaks. I didn't really need another Darth Vader or another Sabine Wren without her helmet. It feels overpriced. The original retail for 75003 was $24.99 and 8017 was $29.99. But their…

Not sure if this was brought up yet. https://ideas.lego.com/blogs/a4ae09b6-0d4c-4307-9da8-3ee9f3d368d6/post/eb30a864-2ad5-46d9-804b-121383e684df 7 Projects Qualify for the Second 2017 LEGO Ideas Review The Third 2017 LEGO Ideas Review qualifying period ended this Monday morning, January 8th at 12:00 a.m. Central European Time or GMT+1. We are thrilled to celebrate the 7 great projects that have gathered 10,000 supporters between the months of early September 2017 and early January 2018. Congrats to all members who've made it this far! Something unique about this review period is that 3 projects that hav…

After The Force Awakens was released, I looked at the available first wave sets and felt something was missing. To me, the Luggabeast conspicuously absent. Sure, Unkar Plutt was missing, but I wasn't really missing him. When I heard that this set was coming, I got excited. When I saw the preliminary images, I cried out as loud as any other about how bright the blue was. Upon further research, I saw that the blue was right. The Luggabeast shown in the film had a lot of bright blue, but most of it was heavily scratched and marred. It's hard to have the mottled look in LEGO, so they simplified it by going blue. I think it's time now to review and see how well LEGO accomplish…

I don't collect modulars. I don't build modulars. I hear about them a lot though. When I do hear about them, one set seems to be spoken about more than any others. The Green Grocer pops into conversations about modulars seemingly more often than any other. Whether it's the difficulty in getting the Sand Green pieces or how good it looks, or how expensive it is, it's a popular topic of conversation. Wait, you might say. If I have no experience with this set, why should anyone want my opinions about it? Well, that's a fair question. I'm not really going to be presenting my opinions about the set, about its looks or the difficulty level of building it. Instead, I am pro…

Reading some of the threads on the forum, members sometimes bring up the amount of vendors that are selling a particular LEGO item. This made me think about coming up with a way to see how many people are selling an item and then what the sales rank of that item is. This can be a good indicator for you aggressive sellers out there to see a void that might need to be filled. If you see a low number of vendors with a lower numbered sales rank (lower than 100), this could be a great opportunity to unload some of those sets. If you see a high number sales rank with a high number of vendors, you might want to either hold on for a while and see what happens or just unload t…