Over the last 2 years LEGO has been taking more and more (legal) action against German retailers and YouTubers they consider detrimental to their business. Legal alternative brick brands have gotten pretty big in Germany recently - you might say that just LEGO's actions themselves have pushed the alternatives' popularity further (cue "Streisand effect"). Obviously TLG is losing (German) market shares big enough to make them unhappy - their answer being to send out their lawyers to take care of it (instead of making their own products better or setting affordable prices again, for instance).

Now, while the "Brick Wars" are getting more and more intense in Germany, I've got the impression that outside the country no one is really taking notice - or maybe no one cares. I'd like to know what people outside Germany/Europe really hear/read/know about what LEGO is doing here?

22 minutes ago, Brystheguy said:

Selling LEGO has allowed me to have deep pockets. Not sure the same can be said about the secondary market for BlueBrixx. 

It would have helped your understanding had you read what I acually posted this for in the first place: "...people who intended to buy this set for their own collection...".

It would have helped your understanding had you read what I acually posted this for in the first place: "...people who intended to buy this set for their own collection...".

We get it, you are off the Lego bandwagon. You have made that abundantly clear by now. Since you are no longer interested in "overpriced" building sets maybe you should look for a new group to join, because I seriously doubt that you are going to change anyone's mind here.

32 minutes ago, Shortbus311 said:

2 hours ago, Frank Brickowski said:

It would have helped your understanding had you read what I acually posted this for in the first place: "...people who intended to buy this set for their own collection...".

We get it, you are off the Lego bandwagon. You have made that abundantly clear by now. Since you are no longer interested in "overpriced" building sets maybe you should look for a new group to join, because I seriously doubt that you are going to change anyone's mind here.

"Overpriced"? What you mean is overpriced. But I get that your world is shaking fundamentally hearing rational arguments, so I'll leave you alone.

Edited February 7, 20214 yr by Frank Brickowski

"Overpriced"? What you mean is overpriced. But I get that your world is shaking fundamentally hearing rational arguments, so I'll leave you alone.

It would help your understanding if you take time to think about what you read before replying. "Overpriced" is in quotations, meaning that I am quoting you saying that Lego is overpriced.

As far as your other brands of bricks go, last I checked this was a Lego investing forum. Are there investment opportunities in your other brands? If not, I really think you should quit wasting time trying to promote them here.

3 minutes ago, Shortbus311 said:

It would help your understanding if you take time to think about what you read before replying. "Overpriced" is in quotations, meaning that I am quoting you saying that Lego is overpriced.

As far as your other brands of bricks go, last I checked this was a Lego investing forum. Are there investment opportunities in your other brands? If not, I really think you should quit wasting time trying to promote them here.

Oh man... I wanted to make you understand that LEGO actually IS overpriced so you don't have to put it in quotation marks. Assuming this is not the only thing you won't be willing to understand, I will not even try.

I was a kid in the 70's and 80's. You don't need to tell me Lego is overpriced. It always has been. Always. 

Oh man... I wanted to make you understand that LEGO actually IS overpriced so you don't have to put it in quotation marks. Assuming this is not the only thing you won't be willing to understand, I will not even try.

Last time I checked, the market decides proper prices. If no one is willing to pay $70 for a 450 piece Star Wars set then Lego would stop making them. Obviously they do still make them, so that reasons that they sell them at that price. You can say Lego is expensive, but if it were truly overpriced then it wouldn't be one of the best selling toys in the world. Your argument doesn't hold water.

13 minutes ago, Shortbus311 said:

Last time I checked, the market decides proper prices. If no one is willing to pay $70 for a 450 piece Star Wars set then Lego would stop making them. Obviously they do still make them, so that reasons that they sell them at that price. You can say Lego is expensive, but if it were truly overpriced then it wouldn't be one of the best selling toys in the world. Your argument doesn't hold water.

I was literally just sitting down to type a message very similar to this one. There is something to be said for brand value and, probably more important, the fact that more often than not you can be certain that when you buy a set from LEGO it will either hold or increase in value.

Having said that, some of those builds do look pretty good and make me wish that LEGO continues adding to the Medieval line after this one set.

technically, market forces dictate what is a "fair price", but no one thinks n95 masks at $25 is a "fair price"

Lego has evolved, for whatever reason, to have close to a monopoly in the building blocks category. So they can hold parents hostage pretty much. If they doubled the price maybe they'd lose their customer base but they certainly can charge them 25% more than what they otherwise could charge if there would be a mainstream alternative, which there clearly isn't.

I think Lego is cheaper relative to income now than it was in the 90s, but it has definitely caught up in the last three years.

Well, I plan on buying LEGO with an iron fist. There are those who are hedging it is overpriced. But if we all buy, it’ll create an epic short squeeze and we’ll all be super rich. 
Suddenly, I’m getting that deja vu vibe. 
 

7 hours ago, Shortbus311 said:

Last time I checked, the market decides proper prices. If no one is willing to pay $70 for a 450 piece Star Wars set then Lego would stop making them. Obviously they do still make them, so that reasons that they sell them at that price. You can say Lego is expensive, but if it were truly overpriced then it wouldn't be one of the best selling toys in the world. Your argument doesn't hold water.

What nonsense. Just because something sells well is no proof at all that it is NOT overpriced (cue all the ridiculously overpriced (while same-quality as the competition) but still very well-selling "Apple" products). It's only proof of the stupidity of some (or in this case a lot of) customers - which is (in this case) of course one of the reasons this whole investing things works so well ...

Edited February 8, 20214 yr by Frank Brickowski

Is LEGO over-priced?

Seriously, there's THIS discussion HERE?

you all lost your minds

10 hours ago, iahawks550 said:

I was a kid in the 70's and 80's. You don't need to tell me Lego is overpriced. It always has been. Always. 

Yeah, my point being that you NOW don't have to take this anymore and you have good alternatives. But most LEGO fans (outside Gremany) obviously are not willing to listen to rational arguments.

7 hours ago, Bricklectic said:

technically, market forces dictate what is a "fair price", but no one thinks n95 masks at $25 is a "fair price"

Lego has evolved, for whatever reason, to have close to a monopoly in the building blocks category. So they can hold parents hostage pretty much. If they doubled the price maybe they'd lose their customer base but they certainly can charge them 25% more than what they otherwise could charge if there would be a mainstream alternative, which there clearly isn't.

I can only recommend looking at what is happening in Germany right now. LEGO is kind of destroying themselves in a way with their extremely bad/clumsy style of communication alone. They should be at an all-time low popularity because of that and I'm quite sure their market share is shrinking at the same time - and thousands of German AFOBs (brick fans) (former LEGO fans that is) are even making fun of them meanwhile.

In Germany it has become fashion to dislike LEGO because of how they're acting and what they're (not) releasing - while Germany at the same time has the strongest LEGAL alternative brick market worldwide, I guess. That's a worst-case scenario LEGO has created single-handedly, by the way. And I honestly don't know how LEGO would ever be able to stop this trend. I think they will not be able to, hence 2021 could in fact mark the year they started losing the German brick market for good. This might sound unbelievable for people outside Germany who have no idea what's going on here - that's why I tried to shed some light on the situation in another thread.

Edited February 8, 20214 yr by Frank Brickowski

On 1/29/2021 at 4:12 AM, Frank Brickowski said:

First of all they even send many sets of their own in-house series with no box - just for the reason of saving on shipping cost.

Secondly, no, they don't have the license for the 20th Century Fox ALIEN franchise. But that does not matter since nowhere do they claim to have it and none of what they are using/selling in the form of brick sets is protected (like the common English word "Alien" or the designs of extraterrestrial monsters). Recently a German brick store was able to sell their own "Razor Crest" completely legally, just because LEGO/Disney had missed to register their own stuff as trademark in Europe. And the design of the space ship could not be registered anyway. So, again, what is not protected can be used by anyone.

this take is dubious...anyone who says that making a set that looks just like the Razor Crest and claims some sort of legal loophole as making it OK is wrong.

I appreciate you trying to enlighten members of this forum of the battles lines drawn in Germany...but I can't agree with your take on "legal". 

IMO, any idea, name, or image that is a copy or a close copy is wrong regardless of legal loopholes. Not saying LEGO is a saint, but the example of using their name (which is copyrighted) to refer to nonLEGO bricks sounds wrong to me. 

2 hours ago, $20 on joe vs dan said:

this take is dubious...anyone who says that making a set that looks just like the Razor Crest and claims some sort of legal loophole as making it OK is wrong.

I appreciate you trying to enlighten members of this forum of the battles lines drawn in Germany...but I can't agree with your take on "legal". 

IMO, any idea, name, or image that is a copy or a close copy is wrong regardless of legal loopholes. Not saying LEGO is a saint, but the example of using their name (which is copyrighted) to refer to nonLEGO bricks sounds wrong to me. 

I'm with you calling this situation "dubious", fair enough. But still it's not illegal - and that's a big difference. It's also a central point imo to clarify that, as you say, LEGO is no saint. They're a profit-driven company first of all. They don't care about fans anymore, not about kids and not about adults. All they care about money today. It used to be different, but this is the situation today. Anyone still in doubt should look at the German market and witness how they behave as soon as they're seriously losing their monopoly. In this case you'll mostly see lawyers taking action and LEGO showing it's very ugly true face.

By the way ModBrix did not use the name LEGO to refer to non-LEGO bricks. They only used the name "Razor Crest" which was not protected in Europe at the time due to LEGO/Diney's laziness. No competitor in Germany is using the name "LEGO" for non-LEGO bricks since you would be going to jail for this stuff in the end.

Brand loyalty counts for a ton in the US, within just about every product category. People are willing to pay extra for a known quality and reputation, even if a generic brand is identical.

4 hours ago, Frank Brickowski said:

Yeah, my point being that you NOW don't have to take this anymore and you have good alternatives. But most LEGO fans (outside Gremany) obviously are not willing to listen to rational arguments.

Sod off, back to you cottage peasant, dont meddle in matters of Knights of the brick table.

Why is there a bogus bricks employee posting here?  Unfortunately I have to see his drivel when you guys quote him as I blocked him ages ago with probably similar incompetence.  Go peddle your crap in the dark corner where it is allowed.  Your pointy cap will be waiting for you.  

I am from Germany so I can maybe add something: I know about the Youtuber"HeldderSteine" and all his followers saying lego is a bad company and how every other brickcompany is better/cheaper. If thats the case, buy it.

For the rest: It is a company which wants to earn Money(!!!), so yeah it has to protect its brand. So skip the hate towards lego. And the argument about not caring, oh come on, they do a pretty good job about caring even If there ultimate goal is profit.

1 hour ago, iahawks550 said:

Brand loyalty counts for a ton in the US, within just about every product category. People are willing to pay extra for a known quality and reputation, even if a generic brand is identical.

That explains a lot but Germany was no different until TLG started behaving like a dictator here.

38 minutes ago, Huskers1236 said:

Why is there a bogus bricks employee posting here?  Unfortunately I have to see his drivel when you guys quote him as I blocked him ages ago with probably similar incompetence.  Go peddle your crap in the dark corner where it is allowed.  Your pointy cap will be waiting for you.  

Legal stuff is allowed in any country. But thanks for insulting 80 million Germans, very nice.

6 minutes ago, Frank Brickowski said:

That explains a lot but Germany was no different until TLG started behaving like a dictator here.

It's a reoccuring problem there it seems

7 minutes ago, brickvoyeur said:

It's a reoccuring problem there it seems

You're so funny... except that the situation is the direct opposite. Means: You did not at all get what I'm talking about. Germans are not following LEGO, they're making fun of them and starting to boycot on a large scale.