I just finished scanning my morning Twitter feeds and came across this Wall Street Journal tweet about an article by Clemens Bonsdorf...

 

The popularity of "The Lego Movie" may be coming at just the right time for the Danish toymaker, as the company is expected to report an abrupt slowdown in its U.S. business in 2013 after several years of heady gains.

Closely held Lego will publish its 2013 financial performance Thursday, after the company issued a press release saying, "Our U.S. sales growth last year was more moderate than the...

 

I do not have a WSJ membership, so if any of you do and want to fill us in, it would be greatly appreciated.  Very curious development though, considering LEGO sales were up 9% in the first half of 2013.  Maybe their change of policy(in the middle of 2013) dealing with purchase limits has really affected sales.  Maybe the LEGO investor and reseller has more power than LEGO thinks.  I can't wait until LEGO's financials are released tomorrow...

Lego restrictions and no discounts is a good idea but it is obvious the real reason for this slowing of growth. The reselling market...Say there is an amount like 10 billion that gets spent every year or even more specifically at Christmas time on toys. Lets say 30% of this toy allowance is spent on lego. Well how much of this 30% is spent on Lego sets in the after market. Lego made profit from these sets in 2010 2011 2012 but know they resellers hoarders flippers selling there stock on ebay and amazon in 2013 and 2014 this is directly cutting into Potential TLG Profits.
Another poster mentioned shelves were bare in the Lego aisle so buyers turned to Amazon and Ebay and payed 1.5-4x retail on sets purchased and accounted for by Lego years ago and now there is less money left to buy new sets directly from Lego.
This is the reason for the limits to avoid the slowing of growth while more and more resellers make more and more of the potential amount spent on toys. they want to control their product and inventory exactly for this reason clearly stated by them. If you think even 10-15 % of the amount spent on lego going to resellers years after Lego made their profit is not a big deal your wrong and would certainly hurt their numbers and growth.

The restrictions are to try to prevent the slowing of growth caused by the secondary Lego market. The low numbers are not a result of the no discount/buying Limit rule the no discount/Buying limit rule is a result of the hoarders and resellers potentially taking market share from within TLG Market. Only so much can be spent on Lego every year and if more goes to resellers and less to TLG over time this can be a big problem. The buyer limits and restrictions are steps to try to slow the trend the slowing growth is a sign of the reseller impact on the market. Plain and simple....Kinda

This is very true. Star Wars has ALWAYS been a great seller. This last year was the worst I have ever seen (in my many years of selling) as far as SW LEGO sales goes. Not normal by far.

 

The drop in sales to Star Wars Lego was most likely due to increased interest in the Super Heroes range

Lego made profit from these sets in 2010 2011 2012 but know they resellers hoarders flippers selling there stock on ebay and amazon in 2013 and 2014 this is directly cutting into Potential TLG Profits.

Investors are not the reason why Lego are experiencing a drop in sales, we are putting money in Lego's pockets every time we make our purchases. It also goes to prove that if the vast amount of new investors can't continue to increase Lego's profits then it's a sign that we have a much smaller impact on sales than we first believed.  

Lego, un 2013 da record:

820 milioni di utili grazie a Lego Friends Risutlati recordo per uno dei giochi pi

Actual results here:

 

http://aboutus.lego.com/en-gb/news-room/2014/february/annual-result-2013

So these are the facts:

 

 

Plus the fact that Lego is building a factory in china is also good sign. 

 

Any other jokes? ;-)

Mehr Plastiksteinchen hat Lego vor allem in Asien, einem "immer noch relativ kleinen Markt" f

Mehr Plastiksteinchen hat Lego vor allem in Asien, einem "immer noch relativ kleinen Markt" f

Here are all of The LEGO Groups Annual Financial Reports...   Maybe someone smarter than I can decipher it for me.  LOL

1) As mentioned previously, Chima was supposed to replace Ninjago; but they stumbled out of the blocks with the new series.

If I remember correctly, they released only one episode and then had a delay in production of the series. The second episode didn't premiere until over a month later.

Such new concept wasn't going to catch on without the series. They lost months of sales because of that delay.

 

 

This isn't accurate.  Lego purposefully scheduled three "pilot" episodes on CN between January and the series start date in July.  This is a tactic they are using right now with Season 3 of Ninjago with four "pilot" episodes released to build anticipation for the show and to spur some early sales of the toys.  There were no delays in production of either the Chima TV show or toy line.  You're welcome to question the strategy, but at the end of the year it seemed to have paid off.  From the Annual Report:

 

"Among the top selling lines in 2013 were core themes like LEGO

Looking at the results - It appears that the sky is apparently not falling.

 

I might suggest that the title of this topic be changed (maybe to LEGO Annual Report 2013).

Abrupt slowdown in GROWTH of sales.  Yeah, that would probably be a better title.

 

There's a lot of macro economic indicators pointing to a general broadbased slowdown in growth across the globe going into the end of the year.  Baltic Dry got hammered.  Emerging markets were already in a sell off before El Cliffo in January.  A return to Ice Age hasn't helped.  It would be good to compare Lego's numbers to Hasbro or Mattel, or some of their other competitors.  I suspect all things considered Lego is doing just fine.

I don't really think manufacturing in China is the great threat some of you make it out to be.  The magic in Lego, the je ne c'est qoui, is not only in quality of brick, but also in the licensing, the packaging, the composition and thought that goes into making these sets.  The builders putting these sets together are head and shoulders above and beyond their competition.  You can't fake creativity, and/or imagination.  As long as Lego continues to have the foresight to buy the right licenses and find the right people to put these wonderful creations together their competition can only copy.  Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  Pile of Coach handbags and leather goods knocked off every year in China, yet Coach continues to post good numbers and continued growth.  Lego is no different.

Any other jokes? ;-)

It said right in the report the factory is to help support the growing Asian market. It could grow the Asian market and get more interest therefore helping the secondary market. Not a joke

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

It said right in the report the factory is to help support the growing Asian market. It could grow the Asian market and get more interest therefore helping the secondary market. Not a joke

Sent from my iPad using Brickpicker

I give up.

"Among the top selling lines in 2013 were core themes like LEGO

I don't pretend to know how successful Chima has been for LEGO, but it seems this statement can be a little misleading. I would expect Chima to add the most sales growth in 2013, because it was the only line mentioned that wasn't around in 2012. It has an unfair advantage in calculating "sales growth" because it went from nothing to whatever it ended up at. All the other lines were competing with prior year numbers.

It seems to me they are talking about their overall growth, not any particular theme.

It seems to me they are talking about their overall growth, not any particular theme.

 

But they specifically mention Friends and Chima in that statement

Looking at the results - It appears that the sky is apparently not falling.

 

I might suggest that the title of this topic be changed (maybe to LEGO Annual Report 2013).

I modified the title to sound less ominous.  Overall, TLG's numbers look very solid once again.  I do not see a country by country breakdown(or at least understand the data well enough to translate it into layman's terms), but it looks like the good times will keep on rolling for at least the short term...

But they specifically mention Friends and Chima in that statement

 

We are onto you LEGO - This is obviously just an attempt at influencing re-sellers into hoarding all of the Chima sets!

The joke is that you think this is a good thing.

 

this is a sad joke...   only the bean counters like these types of moves

But they specifically mention Friends and Chima in that statement

They're talking about their overall growth as a final dollar value. It doesn't matter what last year's sales were per theme with regard to that particular statement. They're merely pointing out that Friends and Chima were responsible for a good percentage of their sales in 2013. In 2012 Friends went from zero to whatever it was. There's no way 2013's growth was higher than that, so that isn't what they're saying. I think I need to stay away from this thread.

I'm sorry but, I have no faith in any products made in country that has little in the way of a quality ethic.  Put it this way, I had to go through 11 iPad Mini 2's before I got one without a yellow tint on the lower half of the screen and I'm also thinking of rejecting this one this weekend as the glass isn't stuck on properly  Where was it made?  That's right, in China!  I will purposely avoid sets made in China if at all possible out of principle.  Also, I'll not be surprised if mouldings and designs end up in dodgy hands due to "brown envelope" deals.  I'm in no way racist against the Chinese as most of the ones I've met are very hardworking, resourceful, talented and generous.  The problem is that their economy is expanding at an unsustainable rate which means that corners are being cut in the way of quality and increased debt.  This is one bubble we really need to worry about.