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Was thinking today about the actual meaning of some of the language Lego uses to market its products and started to come up with a list. If anyone has any more examples or explanations, it would be great to share them! LIMITED EDITION (We will produce as many of these as we can until people stop buying them and to screw with resellers´ brains) RETIRING SOON (We have far too many unsold units out back due to pesky resellers inflating our initial sales estimates. Come on guys, buy them now so we don´t have to discount them) EXTRA VIP POINTS ON THIS ITEM (I thought we told you it was retiring soon. Are you dumb? Come on now, buy a few and don´t make us have to discount it). SALES AND DEALS (Ok, you made us do it. Take 50% off all sold out items and 10% off Chima. There, now don´t keep complaining that Lego is expensive - it´s not Megablocks. Are you a reseller or something?) VIP REWARD POINTS (Like any addictive substance, this will make you keep coming back for more and more from us. And as with drugs, when you pass away, there will still be some left in the system) EXCLUSIVE (These products have a high PPC count and are usually not available outside the Lego web for the first 3 or 4 months since release. After that, anyone except the riff raff at Amazon can sell them) ARCHITECTURE (These products have an even higher PPC count and are so expensive that we actually need the riff raff at Amazon to sell them. Mainly bought by adults who live in mansions and employ domestic servants to open the box and sort the parts for them) CLASSIC (Our designers have better things to do than dream up new sets all day. Here, take these random bricks and make your own stuff). IDEAS (When you get good at CLASSIC, send us your best models and we will put them in a shiny box and sell them to greedy resellers for you. (See LIMITED EDITION) RETIRED PRODUCT (You won´t ever be able to buy this from us again - unless it is a XMAS set or we decide to unretire it). SOLD OUT (Resellers, we are mocking you! Is it retired or just out of stock? You will be making long car journeys and spending hours on the net trying to make your number - enjoy your weekend!) TEMPORARILY OUT OF STOCK (This item has become more popular than we estimated or those pesky resellers have been at it again. We will probably make more in a few weeks time so be patient and buy Chima in the meantime) CALL TO CHECK FOR AVAILABILITY (Laszlo from the warehouse says there are none left down there but the computer says we have a couple of boxes more. I think they are in the boss´s office but he is in there with the secretary so we have to wait a while till they go out for lunch to check)

This sounds a lot like one of those vague pledges, with an effective date far in the future, that governments and corporations love to make. I really hope Lego isn't serious. As they say, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Only about 5% of crude oil goes into plastic production, and there are far more wasteful uses for it than Lego. Say, disposable grocery sacks or those impossible to open clamshell packages that make small electronic devices inaccessible without the use of gardening shears. Not to be outdone, I've committed myself to being carbon positive by 2075. I'm assuming that by then I'll be able to gain photosynthetic properties by means of a revolutionary new gene therapy.

Terrible set - STAY AWAY - nothing to see here. move along. move along.

Batcave is a disheartening example. I think it stuck around for 1.5 yrs after is disappeared in EU. I don't think Lonely Mountain is the seller The Batcave is, obviously.

Opening Night by WHBRICKS

HARD TO FIND (It is really hard and difficult to find a retailer that does not carry this set. If you find one, let us know, so we make sure they will carry it in the near future)

As soon as the first new LEGO set is produced with the "new" material, all of the old sets will increase in value. They don't make them like the used to!

Aren't the Chinese already using alternative materials?

The All-American Great Barn featuring a double design with Cluck’s Family Restaurant and Red Rooster Farms. Choose the model with included parts list and then build a modular style restaurant suitable for your Chicken Suit Guy or go completely rural with a charming farm for a country side setting (also good for Chicken Suit Guy). Instructions are available to purchase here. (Note: Cluck's Restaurant version requires 1,246 pieces while the Red Rooster Farms requires 1,786 pieces.)

So the entire Hobbit range is now listed as a retired product in Europe / Asia. The only set left standing is ToO. It's sad to see these go EOL, as a medieval fan from way back I always enjoyed these sets.

FRIENDS (Enjoy recreating the adventures of a typical girl and her friends - when the typical girl is Taylor Swift and her B list celebrity hanger on girlfriends. Learn the importance of your private jet on the environment as you leave a carbon footprint the size of a grizzly bear and enjoy living in a modern penthouse and being pampered at the local Entitlement Salon while those Disney Princess losers are stuck in their castles waiting for some dude to save them). LONE RANGER (Eat that you reseller scum. You thought investing in Lego was easy. You thought you were going to make lots of money doing nothing and off the back of our hard work. Well, losers have this one on us. Heck, we´ll even discount it for you). See CHIMA, EXO SUIT etc etc MIXELS (The idea behind this came from a very sweet story. Our marketing manager once had two rabbits. They lived in the same cage and one day when she went to feed them she found another 10 rabbits! How wonderful, she thought, I love rabbits and now I have 12. 4 months later, 12 more rabbits appeared. Super, I love rabbits, she thought. Everyone loves rabbits and the great thing about rabbits is they all look more or less the same but the devil is in the detail - a bit like Lego bricks. EUREKA!! The idea got put into production and she went to the Heartlake VIP cocktail bar with her FRIENDS to celebrate) LEGENDS OF CHIMA (According to the legend, somehow, somewhere, a reseller actually made money on this theme on the secondary market. No one has ever been able to establish for sure the identity of the person though many claim to be him. It is also belived that the buyer mistook the item Sir Fangar´s Lion Cycle for a Surfing Lion on a Unicycle and made a claim to Paypal for INAD)

More: CITY (An accurate scaled down representation of typical daily life in your average small Danish town. Since the Lego movie came out, Lego staff travel everywhere in helicopters - even to buy a loaf of bread, so we wanted to incorporate that in the 2015 range. In fact, we are so rich that we build new Fire, Police and Train Stations every 3 years even though the old ones were perfectly fine) BIONICLE (What happens to parts from Technic and Ninjago sets that dont sell well but we are too proud to discount or throw out) STAR WARS (Our core product line. In Danish, this is actually pronounced like the sound of the bottom of a barrel being scraped with the sound of a cash register ching-chinging in the background) SHOP AT HOME (Few people know that this was the idea behind Minecraft. You wander aimlessly from one empty link to another and when you finally find what you want and are able to click on it, it is out of stock. At peak times of the year, we recommend you place orders after everyone else has in order to ensure fulfillment)

you are giving sets for free... send some my way too ... i don't mind if you call me douce bag or idiot

Agreed. I think people are way over-thinking this. The Xwing and EV are the next to go by age. We see out of stock frequently on these sets, because regular customers and resellers focus on the oldest sets for a reason, they typically are the next in line to go. Yes i realize Town Hall and B-Wing, and other sets that never seem to retire, etc, but the vast majority go in order, even when we expect them to last longer. SSD - But it's in the catalog! Gone R2 - But he's in the new movie! Gone HHouse - Not SW i know, BUT Halloween is coming up! Gone It'll likely be Red 5 and then Ewok Village, and then Sandcrawler, and then Slave I, etc.

SOLD OUT - seems that it has finally been decommissioned. If they sold 2.5k in half a day that is pretty good going.

"And if these new non-plastic legos degrade in 5 years, forcing you to buy more, we're okay with that"

are they going to add an extra large chin accessory, like the new Darth Vader's lower helmet piece?

Desert Skiffs, $30 on Amazon http://www.amazon.ca/dp/B007Q0OUTY?tag=brickpicker05-20 3 left, I ordered 3

Australia always cops it with both fists from Lego.

daisy duke - i just fell in love all over again. not sure how a German minibus thread segued into a discussion of race relations in the US and its impact on Confederate-themed products but I am really re-appreciating Daisy Duke in that picture. i'd like to take a drive up PCH with Daisy Duke in a T1 . Ok - now we're back on track.

It's a great set, lots of people here doubled up instantly. (SW + MC + $10 set, was easily $200+ sales with the seasonal set thrown in). Even if it is abundance this xmas, stash it away to double up next year. No worries

Not to mention, that ventilation shaft was too small...even for a targeting computer. And don't give me anything about womprats and T-16's either. Here is how I imagine this set gains popularity: 1) Dad takes 6 year old child to see the new movie. 2) Child LOVES movie, so Dad and child visit Lego Store for some sets. 3) Kid is focused on Kylo Ren ship or something new, but the Dad is thinking "Holy s****, look at these Legos! If only they had a really cool X-wing or somthing". 4) That's where I come in.

As you can tell, the concept for the new TFA X-Wing wasn't actually that new. It was based off of old concept drawings, as was this Action Fleet Series Alpha version created in 1995-1996.

Plenty of times on the forum, we see members pointing out good and bad deals from Craigslist listings. Recently I started to spend a little more time on the site to see what is going on. Overall I find some pretty cool finds from time to time. All aren't in my area, but I do like to look and see what is around. I put together a simple feature that will allow you to select several Craigslist regions and be able to look at all of them at the same time. You can also filter the listings by region easily to make it a little easier to see what is available in your area. This is a work in progress, but here are some features that I will be adding to it real soon: Keyword alerts New posts in your selected region alerts A page to view all the available LEGO listings in ALL areas so you can get a quick glance at everything that is going on across Craigslist Need to add pagination for those that are looking for a lot of areas and it downloads a lot of listings. I will have a lot of these features in by tomorrow, I just wanted to get some eyes on it and to see how it does. Please try out the feature and see how it works for you. You will first be asked to select the regions you want to monitor, then you can view those listings. The listings are updated frequently, so you will be able to see updates throughout the day. http://www.brickpicker.com/craigslist/

Has anybody tried these? What do you think? http://yetistand.bigcartel.com/

Nothing to see here. Move along people. These sets are terrible. Poor investments.

Darth Revan = It would have been $50 by now had that 1 guy on eBay with 50+ copies allowed it.

This is very normal. This is called, "The Dance". It's also refered to as F5-ing (the refresh key on your keyboard). This all went down last year too with sets like, Town Hall, SSD, Haunted House, and to a lesser extent Grand Emporium. Do we think any of those sets went to normal customers? No they sold out within seconds of availability. Heck we even figured out which days were more likely to see a restock for the different sites. The question people are asking is, are resellers causing lego to make MORE runs than they planned? The question after that is,,,,does that even matter? If the end customer can't get these products anymore, will a couple hundred (thousand?) extra sets in reseller hands hurt the price 2 years from now? probably not.

I'm not sure how this scenario helps the perceived reseller problem. If they create artificial shortages, the resellers are typically the ones who scoop up the sets as soon as they come back into stock. it seems to me, this kind of situation would drive even more sets into reseller hands then if they just ran out of stock on one day and never re-stocked.

2 weeks to 2 years - Lonely Mountain may have 6 months and harder to find the longer you wait.

Azog's pretty cool as well

If I could have liquid LEGO, that would be cool.

Discounts have been best at Meijer but that is a regional chain and not many could take advantage of getting this one at a deeper discount there. I would be surprised if LEGO keeps making any more LOTR or Hobbit sets after this year.

Few days and it will be sold out everywhere in Europe. It's a bit of a gamble.. but it will certainly become a rare set :-) and there is mainly one thing I learned in my short Lego career up till now: Rare = desirable

Same here. I hope the Theme Park/Carnival series become the next Creator line and let this set be a sleeper as everyone flocks to the Ferris Wheel

Got my numbers mixed up - I meant Birthday Table Decoration set 40153

Needs a giant Iceberg to go with it.

I don't think it's done.

you should be able to get your rewards back. I had an in-store pickup order that I had used $60 in rewards on cancelled on me a few months back. The reward remained unused in my account, but whenever I tried to use it again, it said the reward had been redeemed. I never heard back from any email inquiries, but when I called in, the CS rep was able to issue me a new reward voucher number over the phone. It took about 40 minutes on the phone to work through it all so rather than go through that again, now I only use my rewards in store or on items online that are new and shouldnt be going eol any time soon.

Should notice that this works better on mobile now. The listings load with an infinite scroll so it keeps loading them as you go along instead of all at once.

Looks like ssd is moving at $979.95 @ Amazon. The seller at that price have moved a couple in the last couple of days. . 3 fba Sellers with one each below the $1000 mark

Same here. Most of mine have arrived mint but my last one was in a bag.

My biggest complaint about the Red Five is the dumb stand and how it tilts way too far back. It's like I can hear some lego designer saying to the lead designer, "Sir, it's quite possible that this R5 set is not entirely stable." The lead designer says, "Not entirely stable? I'm glad you're here to tell us these things." But then does nothing about it.

My conclusion is that the majority of current modular collectors and resellers have got in after being caught by surprise and now the set´s performance will go back to being that of when it was on general sale e.g. average. Future patterns could depend on whether any more modulars go this year and if there is a new one in 2016 and on how many new AFOL collectors come into the modular market. The people that predicted HH would be worth the same by the end of the year are probably going to be right as there should be a Halloween sales increase on that. SSD also has the movie to help it so I can see all 3 sets at around 2.5 times MSRP by end of year with R2 and GE not far behind.

Which makes next year an even more fruitful harvest.

I'm worried that as Halloween approaches, resellers with cash flow issues will dump their HH's to free up funds for pumpkins and giant inflatable lawn ghosts.

With your SW OT comments, it's like I don't know you anymore

Successful businesses don't make decisions based on making profit on every single decision they do - they base decisions on maximizing total profit. Cutting losses over sunk costs on a bad-selling set to make way for a better selling set is a strong business decision.

Brickpicker Price graph tells you exactly that about this and RI. What will be interesting to chart is the onward development - how long will it take for demand and prices to pick up again? This will give us helpful indications for the future.