This is not a topic that is taking high priority right now, but it will. Maybe I was a little harsh in my warning, but I didn't mention names. But my point remains that we want people to be honest as possible with their inputs. When members ask for information, we do our best to supply it to everyone and as accurately as possible, as I did when I stated that the GE is more popular than the FB by around 10%. There is some data that is withheld for various reasons, this is not really one of them. I can't recall the thread, but I believe I gave the Top 5 or 10 sets in members Brickfoilios months ago.

Does it really matter though? The Fire Brigade was hoarded by more people in the history of this site and it has almost doubled in value since EOL. So much for over saturation of the market. ;-)

You also have to account for people cashing in on the fire brigade since it has performed so well since December. The brickfolios will drop as the flippers start moving inventory. This 10% doesn't mean much to me.

Patience............some people need it.

You also have to account for people cashing in on the fire brigade since it has performed so well since December. The brickfolios will drop as the flippers start moving inventory. This 10% doesn't mean much to me.

Yes, this was a point that I did think of. So let's say its a push.

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Target is not ebay, they should be selling at rrp and not an inflated "market value."  If Target is holding stock back and selling at inflated prices once a set's scarce, then we're all screwed because Target has greater buying power than any of us.  Not saying that's what they're doing, but we'd never know if they were.

 

Not evil at all, it's just business, customer still has choice to buy or not.

 

When they are selling MHC for $16, everyone loves them!

Not evil at all, it's just business, customer still has choice to buy or not.

 

When they are selling MHC for $16, everyone loves them!

 

I'm not saying that they're evil, I understand that it's business.  I still don't have to like it

everybody is evil

 

when we price our items on ebay, WE are evil.

Lol I cannot fault Target since that is exactly what I would do with my GEs once it is scarce

Everyone else is evil, I am a saint, so there

Target seems to be generally well-liked at the moment.  So if I were a Target bigwig, I'd want to maintain that reputation, and I don't think I'd want "Target" and "price gouging" to start being used in the same sentence.  In the long run, matching reseller prices might turn out to be a bad move for them.

Target seems to be generally well-liked at the moment.  So if I were a Target bigwig, I'd want to maintain that reputation, and I don't think I'd want "Target" and "price gouging" to start being used in the same sentence.  In the long run, matching reseller prices might turn out to be a bad move for them.

TO ME, this looked like poor coding on Target part. I doubt their current floating price practice was done intentionally. They most likely lose the based price point once LEGO put the set to retirement or on long OOS status and ran whatever price comparison algorithm they had. They should have added some kind of ceiling logic to that floating price (so it would not go higher than 1.5x Target's average price from the past 90 days for example).

Why would anyone complain? It's like an easy way to bring up the sale price for resellers. It's $100 over retail and if people are seeing it sold out except for target at that price they will buy more from eBay/Amazon. That in turn will increase (collectively) our sales in turn bringing up the market price. Now if this has been retired for 12 months and target still had them at $250 then that would be a problem

If you follow Target's stock price or recent earnings reports, they've got some issues.  If I were a shareholder, I'd be psyched to see this "price gouging"; it bumps up that margin from the average 4% or so to what I can only guess is more like 50% on a $250 GE (even with RC discount and free shipping).  I also think it's great for resellers generally (wouldn't we want to see TRU mark up the Funhouse to, say, $100 rather than the mere 50% markup that is the current $60?).

So how many of these does everyone have?

I have 1, and another back ordered . I am small time compared to most here, but am also trying to keep my brick folio diverse.

If you follow Target's stock price or recent earnings reports, they've got some issues.  If I were a shareholder, I'd be psyched to see this "price gouging"; it bumps up that margin from the average 4% or so to what I can only guess is more like 50% on a $250 GE (even with RC discount and free shipping).  I also think it's great for resellers generally (wouldn't we want to see TRU mark up the Funhouse to, say, $100 rather than the mere 50% markup that is the current $60?).

 

 

Big box retailers make their money by moving large amounts of merchandise.  It makes little sense for Target to price gauge a handful of GE's.  An extra $1200 on those items sold with the $100 markup is nothing to them in the grand scheme of things.  Normally they would just sell these at msrp and then move on to the next thing.  It's probably either a pricing error (we've seen it go the other way with the MHC), or they're testing the waters with TRU pricing.

So how many of these does everyone have?

I have 1, and another back ordered . I am small time compared to most here, but am also trying to keep my brick folio diverse.

I only have 3.  There are members here that have WAY more then us.  I hope to one day acheive Jedi Lego status.

Amazon GE code from Sunday order : 27R4

I only have 3. There are members here that have WAY more then us. I hope to one day acheive Jedi Lego status.

Do not try to keep up with the Joneses... nothing good ever came out of that

Or it's like when you tell wife you have a 2x12 brick, but really it's just a 2x4 plate.

 

As long as you can find her 1x1 round plate, she'll be happy.

Do not try to keep up with the Joneses... nothing good ever came out of that

It works out for big crooks like target.

Do not try to keep up with the Joneses... nothing good ever came out of that

Very true.  I'm not trying to keep up, I'm just trying to get my foot in the door before it's completely closed.

It's pretty incredible anything thinks that Target adds anything of note to their bottom line from selling a few Lego items...  In fact they probably don't even know their Lego sales exist other than algorithm's automatically changing the price to correspond with apps pre-set weeks in advance.   They probably have one MBA guy running their Ebay page and that's about it. A few thousand in retired toys means nothing to them, they care about their billion dollar clothing lines and produce sections, not about making an extra hundred dollars..

It's pretty incredible anything thinks that Target adds anything of note to their bottom line from selling a few Lego items...  In fact they probably don't even know their Lego sales exist other than algorithm's automatically changing the price to correspond with apps pre-set weeks in advance.   They probably have one MBA guy running their Ebay page and that's about it. A few thousand in retired toys means nothing to them, they care about their billion dollar clothing lines and produce sections, not about making an extra hundred dollars..

I agree with you. They have bigger fish to fry. They aren't like us obsessing over the GE and questioning it's ever move when it's in stock and out of stock on LEGO Shop at Home. They have millions more in other areas to worry about.

I agree with you. They have bigger fish to fry. They aren't like us obsessing over the GE and questioning it's ever move when it's in stock and out of stock on LEGO Shop at Home. They have millions more in other areas to worry about.

It's funny to think about though..

 

Target bigwig: "Johnson! What's the status on our inflated GEs?! We need the profits from those sales to keep our produce and bedsheets alive!

Smith! You better be refreshing that Shop at Home page if you wanna keep feeding your family! We're not getting caught with our price at $249 when that product status hits Available Now!"

It's funny to think about though..

 

Target bigwig: "Johnson! What's the status on our inflated GEs?! We need the profits from those sales to keep our produce and bedsheets alive!

Smith! You better be refreshing that Shop at Home page if you wanna keep feeding your family! We're not getting caught with our price at $249 when that product status hits Now Available!"

Dude, that was funny.........:)

I think someone at target knows what's up with soon to be EOL Lego sets. If it's just some random algorithm, what's the algorithm based on? Is it looking at amazon prices maybe?