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    Brickpicker blog articles on LEGO investing, news, reviews, evaluations, discounts and more...
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    • Fcbarcelona101
      We have all read it before: "I got 5 Vampyre Castles at Walmart for $ 50 each!". Clearance finds is one of the most popular topics of this site, to the point that there are several different threads centered around it. Of course, it makes sense. It is to be expected that when a LEGO investing sets gathers around people from all around the world there is going to be some natural "bragging". To me, that's not bad at all, especially since most of the times members of this site are helpful enough to post where they got it as well as some other information that may help other members to get similar deals.
      This abundance of what everyone sees as amazing deals has an effect that can be both positive or negative, depending on the individual investor that happens to read them. On one hand, seeing those kind of prices can move the investor to a more active deal searching strategy that can pay off big if they are diligent and insistent. On the other, there is a chance that a particular investor looking for clearance deals is spending more money and time looking for deals than it is worth it to them.
      Why could these two scenarios be so different? well, there are several variables that impact an investor's ability to find good deals. The following are just some of them:
      Investor's location: It is no secret that the best deals are often founds in either smaller towns or "low income" neighborhoods. Finding good deals in the larger cities is extremely difficult, both for the sheer amount of people concentrated around the stores and for the variety and, usually, abundance of middle to high income families. Investor's effort: It can't be denied that someone who tries harder is more likely to find good discounts than someone that only makes an occasional trip to the large retailers. Having said that, as we will see later this is not necessarily a good or bad thing in and on itself. Store policy: Most of the time, the decision about what items to clear from the stores is left up to each store's manager. There is not much the investor can do about this point, just get to know the local store policy and maybe get to know the employees. To me, those three are the most important factors that result in an investor being able to find or not clearance deal in their particular location.
      Having laid this out, I want to get to the real point of this article: Is hunting for clearance deals really cost efficient and rewarding both short or long term?. There is no clear answer to this question, as each investor is different and has a different strategy and resources. When I was writing my Cost of LEGO investing articles, I got to see first hand the financial impact hunting for clearance deals in stores can have on the investor's bottom line, so in here I would like to isolate that topic in particular and determine who can benefit and who can't with this strategy.
      For the mentioned article, I used the AAA estimated cost per mile to drive a vehicle in the US as a way to know what is the price of driving around from store to store on any given day. Adding to that, there is definitely the cost of the investor's time that could be spent doing something else, but since that is really dependent on each individual there is not really a good number I could use that applied to everyone, so just know that we are keeping that out of the equation.
      AAA's estimate cost per mile driven is somewhere around $ 0.61. This cost is inclusive of gas as well as pretty much every single cost that is included while driving like insurance, repairs, etc. So. let's examine several different scenarios using only one set as our main example. Let's base our numbers on 9474 Helm's Deep and use several different investor profiles.
      Scenario 1: The investor drives 15 miles to the local Target/Walmart and finds Helm's Deep on clearance for $ 80. Purchase: 2 Sets. (Taxes are ignored)

      Scenario 2: The investor drives to the same store, but this time acquires 5 sets, all of the ones that are available on the shelf.

      You can clearly see that, logically, the more sets the investor purchases the more the fixed cost of driving is spread out. As a result, the investor buying in larger quantities actually benefits greatly from the clearance price, while the small buyer gets a price that is not much lower than what we have seen on the set at some points.
      Now, this analysis leave something out of the picture: it assumes both investors did only one trip to the retailer and found the set on clearance on their very first try. We all know this is extremely unlikely, and even if it were to happen it is very hard that this could be the case every single time the investor visits the store. Usually, investors make several trips to the stores where they find absolutely nothing worth purchasing, so let's add those costs to our analysis.
      Scenario 3: The investor drove to the store two times before scoring the deal explained above, and purchased the 2 sets on his third visit.

      Here you have it. If the investor drove three times back and forth between his home and the local retailer and bought the two discounted sets at $ 80, the ending cost of each set is almost $ 110. We have seen the set at around this price point several times on different online retailers. Scenario 4: Same as Scenario 3, but this time the investor bought 5 sets on the third visit.

      Once again the large investor gets a better deal. Having said that, I think it is pretty evident that the potential costs are very sensitive and can add up quickly in both cases with each individual visit to the store. The moment the investor visits the store more than 4 or 5 times without finding a deal, the more costly those purchased sets will become. In a lot of cases, the actual cost of the set may very well end up being more than its MSRP. Also, keep in mind that we are ignoring the cost of the investor's time in the scenarios above.
      Even if you only consider gas as your only driving cost, something that is not accurate, the cost of driving a total of three times to a store located 15 miles away from your home will add around $ 10 to the total cost of your sets (assuming 30 MPG).
      What this analysis tells us is that most investors from this site will get better results by purchasing the sets online and browsing the different sites for good deals rather than spending the time and money driving around the stores. Of course, there are some investor that can benefit from hunting for clearance deals:
      An investor who knows their local market extremely well and scores deals in most of his visits. Brickpicker member Lowest Form Of Wit has several times posted how he is able to visit his local stores (especially Walmart) and get at least one great set for a great price. This does not mean everyone can do it, it just happens that his area is good for LEGO hunting and he has been able to capitalize on that opportunity. High volume investors: As proven above, those investor that have the resources to invest in several copies of the same set are the ones that would benefit the most from hunting local deals. By purchasing as many sets as available at clearance price they are able to spread out the fixed costs of driving among a large amount of sets, therefore making it worth it. If you fall into any of the two categories above, you could continue with your deal hunting strategy as you see fit, always keeping in mind all the costs involved. If you are a different investor than these two types, you are better served spending your time hunting for deals online instead of hunting for that 50% deal that once you factor in the cost of the times you did not find anything can end up being equivalent to a 5% discount....or even to paying above MSRP!
    • Quacs
      In my last blog entry, I estimated and discussed the number of Lego sets, and number of sets by model, that Lego releases yearly. To summarize my estimate, TLC releases about 82 million sets, and roughly 160,000 of every model number globally.
      To further the discussion, I figured I would try to estimate the number of sets, and number of sets by model, that are released by continent to get a better feel for each of these mass markets, and then try to further segment these mass markets into markets by specific countries.
      To determine the percentage of sets for each continent, I looked up the GDP by continent, and used the percentage of continental GPD vs. global GDP to come up with a multiplier. Then, the quantity of sets and sets by model were multiplied by the GDP percentages to come up with a set total by continents. Without further ado, here are the results:
      Data provided by the World Bank
      Asia: 30.8% of global GDP / 25.2 million sets / 49,700 sets by model number
      Europe: 30.5% of global GDP / 25.0 million sets / 49,200 sets by model number
      North America: 27.8% of global GDP / 22.8 million sets / 44,900 sets by model number
      South America: 6.0% of global GDP / 4.9 million sets / 9,700 sets by model number
      Oceania: 2.5% of global GDP / 2.1 million sets / 4,000 sets by model number
      Africa: 2.4% of global GDP / 2.0 million sets / 3,900 sets by model number
      What do we glean from these estimates? First, while the US market is the biggest in the world, the Asian continent claims the biggest GDP, and therefore the largest percentage of sets among the continents. Europe is actually second largest, slightly behind Asia, which begs the question of whether pricing differences between European and North American markets are about how each market perceives the value of the toy rather than the competition of the market.
      To get a deeper, and perhaps more useful estimate of how many sets each individual markets receive, let's further segment the continents into specific countries. I will use the % GDP of the country to the continent and multiply this percentage by the quantity calculated for each continent above. Here are the results for specific countries by continent:
      countries are listed in alphabetical order by continent
      Asia - 49,700
      China: 38.8% of Asian GDP, 19,300 sets per model number
      Japan: 28.1%, 14,000 sets
      India: 8.7%, 4,300 sets
      South Korea: 5.3%, 2,600 sets
      Europe - 49,200 sets
      Denmark: 6.4% of European GDP, 3,100 sets per model number
      Germany: 16.2%, 7,970 sets
      France: 12.5%, 6,150 sets Italy: 9.6%, 4,720 sets
      Spain: 6.4%, 3,150 sets
      UK: 11.6%, 5,710 sets
      North America - 44,900 sets
      Canada: 9.5% of North American GDP, 4,270 sets per model number
      Mexico: 6.2%, 2,780 sets
      United States: 82.2%, 36,910 sets
      Oceania - 4,000 sets
      Australia: 90.3% of Oceania GDP, 3,600 sets per model number
      New Zealand: 8.3%, 330 sets per model number
      Here's what I gleaned from these numbers.
      First, the one major caveat with this model is that we know TLC doesn't distribute the sets produced to regions based on its GDP. I used GDP as a proxy for the measure of a country's economic activity and assumed TLC would distribute sets based upon this economic activity, yet this doesn't account for historical factors, purchasing patterns, regional tastes, maturity of the market, etc. As a result, I would expect the Asian figures to be overestimated since China, the second largest market according to the model, is a much newer market than many of the European and North American markets and TLC hasn't had the time to develop as the Lego market in other parts of the globe. In this same vein, I would anticipate the European markets are slightly underestimated by the model.
      That said, there are some interesting observations we see from the model's output. First, this can provide a good concept of the scale of the American toy market to the rest of the world, and an idea of the competition within. When putting the set quantity into a market context, we see that the average number of Lego sets distributed by model number in the US is nearly 37,000 sets. While that seems like a lot on its surface, let's compare this quantity to the number of Walmarts, Targets, Toys R Us, Barnes & Noble stores and Lego Stores in the US:
      Walmarts: 3,490
      Targets: 1,725
      Barnes and Noble: 777
      Toys R Us: 600
      Lego Stores: 35
      Total major brick and mortar retail outlets selling Lego sets in the US: 6,627
      This exercise neglects a whole host of regional and national chains where Brickpickers and others purchase their sets, and another major online resource, Amazon. Quickly assuming these outlets comprise another 1,000 retail outlets, we estimate the average number of lego sets by model number distributed to each retail outlet is 4.9. With 508 model numbers, that means the typical US retail outlet will receive 2,489 total Lego sets in a year, a reasonable estimate by any measure. We know that not every model is sold in every store, so this estimate has some bias.
      Drilling down to from the macro market level to the micro market level can be quite illuminating, and provide Brickpickers some simple estimates to better understand the primary market. The more investors know the primary market, the better decisions they can make regarding their investment decisions.
       
    • runner.caller2
      I recently went to the store and could not believe some of the clearance deals they have on LEGO sets. Before this trip I purchased Jabba's Palace and spent about the exact same amount of money. However, I nearly doubled the amount of bricks for my buck compared to the single set. I will break down each purchase for you with excel graphics. NOTE: I was going to do the excel bit, but for some reason this site wont let me copy and paste pictures and it doesn't leave excel cells in the right format. See Attached if you're really interested.
      Purchase 1 Set ID Set Name Price Paid Retail Pieces Price per Brick 9516 Jabba's Palace $101.72 $119.99 717 $0.142
      So I made this purchase in March 2013 and I was brand new to the investing game. I saw it on sale at WalMart and Immedtialy purchased it because it was on sale and there was only 2 on the shelf so I assumed that those were the last two EVER!
      Since then, I have seen many more around, but overall I am still fairly happy with this purchase. It has quite a few minifigures and my friend had the old one (4480) that we played with quite a bit in our preteen years and that one did fairly well from an investing standpoint.
      On to Purchase 2; Purchase 2 Set ID Set Name Price Paid Retail Pieces Price per Brick 3816 Glove World $14.82 $19.99 169 $0.088 6865 Captain America's Avenging Cycle $9.62 $12.99 72 $0.134 6865 Captain America's Avenging Cycle $9.62 $12.99 72 $0.134 44005 Bruizer $6.87 $12.99 62 $0.11 76001 The Bat vs. Bane: Tumblr Chase $29.66 $39.99 368 $0.08 76009 Superman Black Zero Escape $6.34 $19.99 168 $0.04 76009 Superman Black Zero Escape $6.34 $19.99 168 $0.04 76009 Superman Black Zero Escape $6.34 $19.99 168 $0.04 76009 Superman Black Zero Escape $6.34 $19.99 168 $0.04 9677 X-Wing Star Fighter and Yavin 4 $7.40 $9.99 77 $0.10 Total $103.36 $188.90 1492 $0.07
      Now these items were on clearance and I was floored at how low some of them were. I immediatly drove my scooter two blocks home and got the SUV to bring these back to my apartment. I will highlight a couple of the key components of this purchase comparison.
      1) Money Spent Number of Bricks.
      I spent nearly the same amount on both purchases. However the first purchase containted 717 pieces and 9 minifigs at $0.142 per brick.
      The second prucase included 1492 pieces (more than double the first) and 26 minifigs at an overall of $0.07 (including 2 Captain America, 4 Superman, 4 Lois Lane, 4 General Zod, Sponge Bob, Sandy, Patrick (covered in chocolate ice cream), Batman, Gordon, Bane, and more).
      2) Clearance Deals The highlight of the purchase was the 4 Superman Black Zero Escapes that I was able to pick up for 70% off each. You just can't pass up a 20 dollar set when you can get it for $6.34 after tax. Those were $0.04 per brick Astounding!

      3) Unorganized
      The store's inventory was really unorganized. I walked around a lot and I found LEGO sets in the LEGO isle, clearance LEGO sets in 3 different isles, clearance LEGO sets along the back wall, and clearance LEGO sets on the end caps. Every time I turned around there was another surprise. This disorganization was really helpful because I feel like there are probably a lot of people that would have bought one of those 4 Superman sets at 70% off if they had been in the LEGO isle. (Usually that's where people look for LEGO sets ).
      4) Location
      A city/town size of 20,000 is just about right for this. The population is big enough to move inventory at a decent pace, but small enough that there are probably not many LEGO investors looking for the deals I am.
      I did go back two days later and they marked the prices down even further on a few items. It turned out that I missed the mark down by one day, but with a few of those sets there was only one left so oh well. I picked up one more Captain America's Avenging Cycle for 6.87 at 50% off and one more X-wing Star Fighter for 5.28 at 50% off.
      I will be going back this week to see if I can get the last Captain America's Avenging Cycle for 70% off. I also passed up a firefighting set that was normally 40 dollars and was marked down to 13.98 so I'll see if that's still there. I am probably going to make this a weekly endeavor considering how close the location is to my apartment. I have decided that I will only purchase sets at 70% off unless I want multiples at which point I will purchase at 50%. And if I really want it. Like with the Sponge Bob sets, I will buy them for 30% off. I don't know about you guys, but I am never paying retail again.
    • TheOrcKing
      FTL: Faster Than Light is a top down, real time strategy, rogue-like indie game created by developers Subset Games released for digital distribution on September 14, 2012. The general premise is you, the player, are the high ranking commander of a faster-than-light travel capable spacecraft belonging to the remnants of a once great Federation trying to transport secret tactical information to headquarters which could ensure victory over the malicious Rebels all the while avoiding destruction or capture from the aforementioned foes. Although in the beginning you have access to only the Kestrel-class cruiser, there is a total selection of nine different ships each having their respectively unique layouts, equipment, and crew; all of which is upgradeable and customizable to a degree. Warping between waypoints on a randomly generated grid of space vectors, you never know who or what you may find in an effort to reach your destination with every leap potentially being the last before possible annihilation. To form one final note before moving along, some of the gameplay and look has been considered to share similarity with the Battlestar Galactica tabletop board game.
      Official Trailer – IGN

      Now on CUUSOO is a submitted collaborative project between CrashSanders and GlenBecker with the approval of Faster Than Light’s original creators, Justin Ma and Matthew Davis, featuring a number of creative mini builds based on various star cruisers from said indie game.
      Kestrel

      Federation Cruiser “Osprey”

      Engi Cruiser “Torus”

      Stealth Cruiser “Nesasio”

      Slug Cruiser “Man ‘O’ War”

      Zoltan Cruiser “Noether”

      Mantis Cruiser “Basilisk”

      Rock Cruiser “Bulwark”

      Coinciding with what was stated on the designers’ project page and personal blog; these are very much like the same designs found in the Star Wars: Planets sets which could be considered a niche area. Although they may not possess intricately high amounts of features, I have respect for anyone who can make something come across more detailed than it actually is in the same way pixel artists do within their artwork.

      In closing, I believe this idea has some hidden potential. True, perhaps the mini builds will not impress a number of people but the decision to build at such a small scale could have been more to do with Lego’s seemingly strict stipulations against large detailed builds especially for relatively unknown properties. (You can read a more in depth article about the project designers’ decision to go micro-scale here on GlenBricker’s blog review titled “FTL: Why not make them bigger?”) Considering the Minecraft project based on an indie game itself passed review to be turned into an actual licensed Lego product and has become so popular they will be releasing two more sets based on the property, somehow I find this idea also based on an indie game having little resistance in being passed.
      Since the Faster Than Light project was approved past the Summer Review deadline (June 3rd), this shall be up for assessment by Lego in September. Until then, let us keep a couple of fingers crossed for something good to come from this. Who knows? Maybe Lego will design a minifigure scale version of the Kestrel.
      Thank you for reading.
    • Fcbarcelona101
      In this entry of the BrickIndex Spotlight we will be focusing our attention in only the second set from the Architecture theme that has been retired so far (if you don't count the Sears Tower version as an actual retirement). Up to this point, we have really not had any significant amount of data to determine the secondary market success of sets in the Architecture line, and we have been using the only retired set, John Hancock Center, as our only guide. Thankfully, Sungnyemun can now be considered as retired even though you might still find some renegades at your local B&N stores. Let's take a look a closer look at this set.
      Sungnyemun 21016 is based on a National Treasure of South Korea located in Seoul. Even though the site can be considered historic and a world landmark, it really does not hold the same international appeal that some of the other ones reproduced in the theme like the Empire State or the White House. The representation is actually quite good, and in my opinion a must have for any Architecture collector. Having said that, I believe that the less known nature of the landmark can really shed some light in just how popular the overall theme can be. In my opinion, if this particular set does well in the secondary market, it should follow that the most famous buildings represented on the theme will do at least as well (Always keeping in mind differences in size, detail, price, etc.)
      The following are the graphs based on Brickpicker data about quantity of sets sold and value information:


      The first graph shows eBay sales activity over the past 12 months. As you can see, the set has a pretty decent activity level that is even greater than some of the smaller and, one would think, most popular designs. It will be interesting to see if the sales trend continues in the coming months.
      Second, and most relevant to us, is the values graph. This graph shows a clear upward trend starting around the month of February that seems to have stabilized a bit between April and May. This type of movement is typical for a recently retired set, but at the same time it helps confirm the investment potential of the Architecture theme as a whole. The set is currently at 80% over retail, still shy of the 180% showcased by the JHC. There are, however, some differences between these two sets that we should keep in mind while doing this analysis. First and foremost, the JHC was a smaller and cheaper set, something that usually translates in larger percentage changes by default if the set ends up being successful. Also, Sungnyemun was on the shelves for a shorter time than the JHC, about a year, something that could help explain is recent rapid growth in value.
      My personal take on this set is that it has already gone through most of its rapid growth phase, leaving some room for long term growth. I would imagine that given a shorter production run the set might experience larger returns than most of the other Architecture sets, but then again it has is relatively low popularity to sort of cancel that out, in my opinion. Still, it is pretty early to determine if the set will end up being an investment powerhouse, but for now I would not invest further in the set at its current market value. I would, however, consider selling some as a relatively quick flip, or just hold for a few months to see where it goes.
      Recommendation: Hold/Sell
    • DoNotInsertIntoMouth
      I think there are many types of investors and many types of investing strategies that those investors use. We all look at different sets in different ways and I think that 80% of Lego sets or more have an investor somewhere that believes in them. If you have read any of my stuff, you know I am one of the more safe investors out there – I don't invest thousands and thousands of dollars so I try not to reach with any of my buys. Yes, I may not cash in on sets like the Zombies, but I am more interested in as close to guaranteed growth as possible. Because of this I wanted to really take a look at a set that I think is possibly the most safe investment out there, even at retail price: The Monster Fighter's Haunted House 10228. The Monster Fighters theme is one that was met with a little skepticism at first. I think most people thought there was definitely a market out there for Halloween themed sets, but in looking at the lineup, some of us wondered how well these would take off since there really isn't a central story behind everything. However, after the resultant popularity of the sets and the fact that The Zombies 9465 is sitting at somewhere near 1 Billion percent CAGR, that has been put to rest. There is obvious growth potential in the secondary market for this theme. When I first looked at the them, I honestly wondered about several of the sets. I had seen them all in Walmart and had thought they were kind of cool looking, but nothing really stood out. The Vampyre Castle set was somewhat tempting, but again, I didn't have that familiar theme or factor that really pulls me towards any of the sets like Star Wars and Lord of the Rings. I had heard there was another set in the theme – one that was Hard to Find. These were coming out right when I was just getting to into Legos, so I didn't understand much about Hard to Find items and how scarce they are. I happened to go to Disney World shortly thereafter and had a chance to see this set in a display case. I was amazed. I am absolutely not a Halloween fan. I don't mind the culture of it, but I hate dressing up and I am not really into giving out candy and going to parties. I think haunted houses are aright, but nothing that I see and have to go in. But this set just floored me when I saw it. The incredible detail and the fact that the set just shines when it is displayed. Your eyes are absolutely drawn to it. I went back after this and shortly later found Brickpicker. I started to research other's feelings on the Haunted House and have really studied the history of secondary investment winners. Now, looking at this set compared with everything else out there right now, I can't see a set that will come close to matching it in growth potential. Yes, the Zombies will continue to grow, but as a smaller set, it most likely has a ceiling. This set doesn't have much of one in my opinion. So, I decided to do an in depth article about the set and go as deep as we can to really look at its investment potential. A note before hand: I would love to do a picture review/build of this set, but I only have a few at this time and I have not broken any open to build. I may soon though. First off, let's look at everything the set offers according to Lego: The crooked Haunted House is home to the scariest ghosts and monsters. Tremble in fear as you open the gate, go weak at the knees as you step onto the porch and gasp in horror at the fireplace, kitchen, office, folding staircase, bedroom, potion room, music room and collection of other creepy objects. Dare you enter the Haunted House?!
      Add to your LEGO® Monster Fighters Collection with the first official LEGO® Haunted House! Includes 6 minifigures: 2 glow-in-the-dark ghosts, Vampyre, Vampyre's Bride, Zombie chef and butler Features unique ‘crooked’ design featuring boarded up windows and working front gate. Haunted House opens to reveal detailed interior with 3 floors. First floor features fireplace that swings open and displays a ship in a bottle on the mantle. Cook up a ghoulish meal with the Zombie chef in the kitchen complete with old-style stove, jars and table! Write letters from the Vampyre’s haunted office! Pull the lever hidden in the chimney to release the drop down staircase and access the top floor! Top floor features gramophone, records and newspaper LEGO® elements. Customize the Haunted House with new stickers for wall hangings, spider webs and curtains! Measures 15.4” (39cm) high, 9.4” (24cm) wide and 7.5” (19cm) deep Just looking at the description and picture itself, what do we see that really screams winner about this set? Detail! It is insane! I am sure a lot of you are like me and have noticed that over the history of Lego sets, one thing that Lego does really well is find ways to improve details of a set. The easiest way to look at this is to examine the remakes inside the Star Wars themes. Most of the remakes are tremendously more detailed than their older counter-parts. This set represents the pinnacle of that detail. Just looking at the outside of the house, it is amazing. The fence is so crisp and real looking. The building looks like a model. My father was into model trains and we used to build modular buildings like this that were hard plastic. This looks like one of those. It is hard to tell from farther than a couple of feet that it is Lego. The outside of the house is smooth and the colors are perfect. The wood across all the windows and the shutters hanging off really show this set off. The wood bricks are very realistic – I recently built the Orc Forge and was really impressed with the wood bricks in it, and this set has more than 10! But Lego, in their infinite wisdom, does even more for us. The house itself has rooms – It opens up! The chef's kitchen with the pot and the snake is just tremendous. But I think it's the smaller details that set the set apart. In the kitchen, there is a bottle and a Lego jar along with a stove and a pot on that. There is also a large spider web in the corner. In another area there is a tiny record player and the set comes with another mini Lego record. In the bedroom, there is a chest along with the headboard and there are torches on the walls and a plant in the corner. The set also comes with several bottles with an assortment of items inside them including bones. Details like this just don't come in other toys.:    
      On the left hand side, there is a staircase leading up form the first floor to the second. I really love the ladder, though, on the second floor that goes up through a hole in the floor to level 3. There are pictures all over the walls as well. The outside of the house is an amazing display piece while the inside is a giant play-set:

      The minifigures are tremendous as well. The Lord Vampyre and Vampyre's Bride and the two Ghosts are all great, but they are found in other sets in the line so they don't add a ton of value to this set. However, there are two exclusive minfigures in the Zombie Butler and Zombie Chef. The Butler is my favorite of the two. I think he is amazing looking. He will really be the popular and expensive minifigure from this set. The Frankenstein-like head is great and the Butler getup with the vest and white shirt is perfect. The tray and the bottle and wine glass make the character as well. Without knowing the name of the figure you know it's a zombie butler!

      The Zombie chef is not far behind. The gray face is really mesmerizing and the nasty green grin really sets it off. Of course he has the normal Chef attire, but it is covered in blood. This minifigure is going to be extremely popular as well.

      On top of this, this set is a tremendous value at $180. $.09 PPP is exceptional on a Hard to Find set and especially one of this caliber. Most of the best PPP ratios are in sets like the Tower Bridge and Taj Mahal that have 4-5K pieces. At 2000 though, there aren't too many sets that meet this standard and are still this impressive (really R2D2 is the only obvious one that comes to mind). So why does all this make us think the set will be a good investment? If you look at the best gaining large (2000+) sets of all time, what do most of them have in common? Detail! Go back and look at the modulars that have retired like the Green Grocer 10185 and Market Street 10190. How about 10179 the Millennium Falcon? How about the 10196 Grand Carousel? What do all of these have in common? Crazy, insane detail. I think this set fits right up there with all of these. But this set has even more. Lego has really started, in the last several years, to try to make larger display sets that also have a play-set value like 10188 the Death Star and 10236 The Ewok Village. This set is really one of kind in the fact that it is a large modular and a play-set. There is really something for everyone. Unless you hate Halloween and haunted houses, how could you not like this set? For the record, my wife hates being scared and therefore hates haunted houses. She loves this set. Looking at it I can't find a bad thing about it. So, I think I have driven in how cool this set is – What can be compare it to? Well that is the hard part. It is one of a kind. But that only helps it as nothing can rival it. The only really good comparisons we have are 2 retired modulars: Both have done incredibly well. And again – these were just really display sets. This one has a play-ability aspect as well. There aren't a lot of kids that have all the modulars. This set fits right with the modulars, too. Take a look at this picture of them together with the Haunted House:
      Looking at these, and the modulars in general, each new set has had about 10% less CAGR. Market Street is sitting at around 57% CAGR, and then the most recent in the Green Grocer is sitting at 34%. I for one, can not imagine that the Haunted House wont match the Green Grocer. But to be safe, we can say our expected lower limit is 30%. Looking at the two comparison sets, and what this brings to the table, I think this set could come close to hitting 50% depending on all the factors we will discuss below. It will be tough to match Market Street, but this set has an insane amount of potential. So I think most people could look at the set and say “Yes it is really cool” and “Yes other modular-like sets have done really well”. So what else really sets this set apart? What is the set's X-factor? Here we go:
      Monster Fighter theme popularity – This may not be the most popular theme of all time, but Lego has nothing else like it. Every year, Lego comes out with another popular movie theme, or another Castle theme, and more Star Wars sets, but this is simply a unique theme. And because of that, getting one of these sets is not enough. You can't buy a Vampyre Castle, and just throw it in between all your Star Wars and Lord of the Rings sets. You need more Halloween sets to go with it. I really feel there will be tons of people out there that will buy a few of these sets in the theme – and have to get them all. Chances are, this theme is one and done as well! Halloween is popular – A lot of people aren't like me and really enjoy Halloween. I sold a couple of Monster's Fighters sets recently to a woman on Ebay who communicated with me a little bit after it. She asked me if I had a Haunted House or The Zombies. I apologized and said no I didn't have any for sale. She wrote back that she had never liked Legos a lot, but loved Halloween and just had to have these. She wanted to collect all of theme and bring them out every year for Halloween. My wife mentioned the same thing. A lot of people will buy Monster Fighters sets and not know this one exists. I live in a moderately Large town and I am from a very Large town. I have searched every Walmart and target in these towns and have never seen this set there. I think there will really be a good number of people that will not know this set exists until it's gone. Lack of discounts – As investors, our number one rule is “Don't pay retail”. Well, that isn't an 100% rule. Would you pay retail now for a 10179 Falcon, or any of the modulars I mentioned? This set has seen literally almost 0 discounts. This is evidenced by the fact that this set is selling for over retail on Ebay. I remember a couple of $10 discounts and the possible Amazon mistake that led to a few selling for $135. Other than that, this set has seen none. I think this is only good for the secondary market because less of them have been sold in bulk. I don't think there have been many people that have seen a discount and bought 20 Haunted Houses. Exclusive minifigures are zombies. Enough said. So with all of this, I have to give a real estimate on it's CAGR right? Earlier, I gave you my limits of worst case 30% to best case 50% CAGR. I honestly think this set will at least see 40% CAGR after 5 years, assuming it retires at the end of the year. With everything I have mentioned, I feel it will be a bit of a disappointment if it doesn't. I am planning on building it in the near future and I have no doubt my projections may improve. It will fit right in with the other modulars in terms of growth. At 40% CAGR, that would make this set worth $968.08. I think it has potential to even do better than that. The set is one of a kind and I think its growth in the next several years will be one of a kind. If you do not have one of this set or more, what are you thinking? I don't think any current set right now has anywhere near the potential this set has. I have trouble everyday buying other sets because I feel like I should put everything I have into these. I think hell will freeze over before this set doesn't do well in the secondary market. I plan to buy as many more as I can afford and I will buy them at retail if I have to. This set is worth that. If you are waiting for a deal, look at those projections again. Is a $10 or $20 discount worth risking missing out on a set with this kind of potential? Sure, 40% CAGR in the current investor and reseller-full market is a little insane. But if anything currently out there has the insane detail, the insane play-ability, the insane popularity, and the insane potential to match it – it's the Haunted House. Note: All of the information here are my own opinions and are pulled from my experiences. You may or may not have success with these methods. Thanks for reading! [ReviewAZON name="LEGO 10228 Haunted Mansion" id="1" display="inlinepost" asin="B0095ZMTE6" trackingid="brickpicker-20" country="" width="200px" float="left" imagetop="10px"] [phpbay keywords="lego 10228" siteid="1" sortorder="BestMatch" minprice="150.00" templatename="default" paging="true"]
    • DoNotInsertIntoMouth
      The Millennium Falcon is one of the most iconic ships in the Star Wars movies and it is personally one of my favorite ships. Unfortunately, I cannot afford to buy the 10179 (yet...) so I was ecstatic when they produced a large play-set model to sustain my Star Wars fantasies until I can get the big one.
      I have been storing this set for a while, so I was really excited to get one out and build away. And what better way to display that than to take pictures of the set and do some investment analysis? I have 5 more of these, so I hope the build and research works out well so I am inline to make money on my investment.

      First up, the box. I generally have not liked the newer Star Wars boxes and, while this one is decent, I don't see anything about it that screams “Buy Me!”. It is fairly large which is enticing, but other than that it is just a picture of the set with some small pictures in the back ground. On the other hand, the Falcon doesn't really need a lot of fanfare – it brings its own.
      The largest set I have built to date is 9516 Jabba's Palace which is slightly over 800 pieces. When I opened this box, this set just felt huge:

      How big are these 5K piece sets??? As I was starting to sort through the bags, it really threw me off. I figured there would be 10-15 bags. I was confused very quickly to see that there were several bags that had the same number on them:
      Like I said, I have never built a set this big so maybe this is normal. This meant I had to open them all at the same time and pour them into a pile ( I can't stand not having pieces available). Unfortunately, this makes it a lot harder to try and find some of the smaller pieces. After pouring out the 3 bag 1's, there are 300-400 pieces on my carpet.
      First, we get to go through the minifigures though. There are no unique minifigures in this set, but I did not have a Darth Vader yet so I was really excited about him. I really liked how they did his head in gray. I guess I should have expected it, but it was surprising to see since all the minifigure heads are pretty close to the same until you attach their hair-hats.
      Put on his helmet and I swore I heard the Imperial March in the background.
      Chewy is up next. I really like the figure, but I have 3 or 4 of these already so it was a little boring. I feel like at some point they could do him a little differently.

      Han is next. His outfit is the same from several other sets, but I really love the smirk. I think they had to of been looking at an actual picture of that Harrison Ford smirk.

      Leah is next with her white garb and hair buns. Again looking at pretty much the same minifigure from other set. The Leah in the Jabba's Palace was a lot more fun.

      Obi Wan is the next minifigure. He is another main character I only have one of. The hat and cape are done really well. The face gives off the old, but wise look as well:

      Last, but definitely not least is Luke. He is a duel outfit minifigure. You have your normal everyday Luke:
      And then your training Luke:

      On to the tremendous amount of pieces sitting in front of me. The bottom part is the base of the ship and holds up pretty well. It is mostly bigger flat pieces held together by 2X4s and 2X8s. There is a slot for an escape hatch as well as spot for a walkway to get up the ship. Nothing crazy exciting in the first bag, but nothing too repetitive either.
      You can see form the bottom of the ship the hatches and how the bottom is patched up. I was impressed how well the base of it stayed together.

      Moving on to bag 2 and we have a lot more fun pieces. This is filling out the inside of the set with all the little toys and gadgets for the characters to use inside the Falcon. There is the control board with two seats. You also have the chess-like round table game that they were playing in the movie with seats around it. There are also several other little sets, tubes and boxes around the set to really add a lot of detail. Since this is supposed to be a play set, these are key to the set's success. Kids want to have easy ways to use their imagination. I enjoyed this bad quite a bit because of all the little unique pieces:
      Here is a picture of the console:

      Bag 3 is the opposite. It is very repetitive and tedious. In this section you are creating the back and mid-sides of the ship that are between the base and the dome-like top of the ship. The build is not necessarily bad, but since it is round, you create the same 2X6 block of pieces in slightly different ways until you have enough to go all around the ship. The problem with this is that they are all just a little different. With repetitive builds, I like being able to make 4 or 5 of the same thing at the same time to save page turning, etc. Unfortunately, all of these were different so they had to be done one at a time:
      And now we add the booster on the back of the ship:
      May not look as good as 10179, but it isn't a $300 lattice piece right? One weird little thing a ran into was a couple of pages in the book still connected together. It is pretty late at night while I am putting so I won't lie about the fact that I may have spent 5 minutes trying to figure out if there was some secret way to open up a centerfold or something.
      The next bag was another accessory and touch-up bag. You added onto the side of the ship where the small cabin is on one side. It also included solidifying the middle section of the ship for all of the outside dome pieces to connect to.
      It also included putting on the ship entrance walk-way on the bottom and the guns. They look pretty cool and spin around. There are also feet so that it doesn't sit directly on the ground:
      Second to last bag and it's a big one. This one is a lot like bag 3 with the repetitive builds. This includes all the dome pieces separately. There are a couple of places where you could build parts a the same time so it wasn't quite as bad. I was surprised, but there is no way to actually connect these pieces together. I knew the ship itself opened, but I thought there would be a way to really close it up. It looked good, but as you can tell from the picture, it was hard to get all the pieces to fit down flush. As a display piece for me, I would have liked it just a little bit cleaner.
      You can also see the satellite and the other set of turrets on the top:
      The last bag is very small. It is the front wedge pieces for the ship along with the side cabin for Han. It was about the size of a normal smaller set's bag, so it was a good switch up from the huge amount of pieces all the other bags had.
      The set itself is really impressive. Even though it has 4.5 times less pieces than the UCS model, it is still huge! It barely fits on my shelf that is a foot deep. I really think the detail is great. Sometimes a set being a play-set is better for display because you have a lot of extras.
      I will say I noticed that some of the parts popped off pretty easily. Inside where you are really supposed to play with the set and minifigures, the set is really solid. However, if you try to fly it around (not that I did that), it is really easy to knock some of the smaller pieces off.
      Still a very impressive and pleasing set and a good build. I have no doubt it will continue to be a very popular set and will be an investment winner (as we will discuss below):

      It's investment time! This set should be really easy for us to make a good prediction on. There are two pieces of this set's potential that I can see as relevant: How have the UCS remake play-sets done? And How have the other Falcons done? The one thing to pay attention to is: with the other falcons, is there anything close enough to make this seem like a non-unique remake?
      Quickly, by UCS play-set I mean a set that is a slight remake of an older UCS set but it is much smaller and includes more extra parts for playing along with more minifigures.
      So what sets match this?
      Well, I don't want to rehash too much widely available information, so I would suggest that if you haven't checked out FCBarcelona101's article on UCS Play-sets, do it now:
      http://www.brickpicker.com/forum/index.php/blog/4/entry-227-star-wars-ucs-playset-edition/
      I want to pull two sets from that article that I think best compare to this set. This is the 10198 Tantive 4 and the 6211 Star Destroyer:
      10198: 9.59% CAGR
      6211: 17.17% CAGR
      None of those sets blew their original UCS set out of the water, but they were both pretty solid and seem to still be steadily growing thought hey have both been retired for several years. Looking at the two, I think the Falcon best compares to 6211 because the 10030 Star Destroyer is really expensive so people buy the smaller one and I think the same thing will happen with this set. When people have a good alternative to a $2500 set, that is a good thing for the smaller set's growth.
      Now, how have the other Millennium falcons done?
      7190: 663 pieces, $99 retail, 6.89% CAGR, 137% ROI
      4504: 985 pieces, $99 retail, 1.63% CAGR, 15% ROI
      10179: 5195 pieces, $499.99 retail, 31.81% CAGR, 422% ROI
      7778: 356 pieces, $39.99 retail, 16.34% CAGR, 83% ROI
       
      Besides 4504, our data looks pretty good. 7190's CAGR is only about 7%, but it has been around almost 15 years, so that it expected. 4504 does scare me though. Looking at it, it is not a lot different from this set. It has the sections that open and the little play-set area inside. It had 5 minifigures that were pretty normal characters as well.The 7965 has a little bit on it with a few extra minifigures and having a more sleek design. It is also about 300 pieces bigger. This is still fairly problematic, though, and a reason why I wouldn't go crazy on this set.
      I think in the end it will experience solid gain. This set has been really popular while it has been out and should retire at the end of the year. I would guess a safe CAGR would be 12.5% after 5 years. That would put this set at $252.28 and give everyone a nice solid gain. I would definitely recommend avoiding this set at retail, but picking it up at the $105-$110 range will be very solid and should allow you to double your money at that 5 year mark (3ish years after retirement).
      All in all though, the set is great and I would definitely recommend building it if you can. It is a really nice, large display piece and a good sub-in if you don't have the UCS set. Don't expect this set to put up the same numbers as the 10179, but I wouldn't bet on it to lose. Note: All of the information here are my own opinions and are pulled from my experiences. You may or may not have success with these methods. Thanks for reading!
    • Quacs
      81,711,327!
      That's the estimated number of Lego sets produced in a year. Let this sink in for a minute.
      Almost 82 million Lego sets are produced in a year.
      How did I calculate this? It's actually fairly straightforward. Using 2012 data:
      1. I found an estimate online for the number of bricks produced by TLC in a year: 19 billion
      2. I divided this by the average number of bricks included per set according to Brickset's 2012 set list: 221
      This yielded a "gross" number of sets produced in 2012 assuming all the bricks produced went directly into sets: 86,011,923 sets.
      3. I threw in a reduction factor to account for bricks produced that didn't make it into retail sets: 5%
      This yielded the current estimate for the number of Lego sets produced in 2012 of almost 82 million.
      That's an incredible number of sets produced by TLC - it's not surprising they're the largest toy manufacturer in the world! Once I had this number, I divided it by the number of models with at least one brick produced in 2012: 508. This yielded an average of 160,849 sets made per model number in 2012.
      Armed with this information, I thought it would be intersting to come up with a mathematical model that predicts the number of sets produced based upon the model's piece count. As you may imagine, this was a little more difficult than figuring out how many Lego sets are sold in a year. Here's the mathematical model I came up with for the line of best fit (where x = is the piece count and y = the number of sets produced by model number).
      y = -295x + 226,014
      So, we can use this model to estimate the number of sets produced for a given model number. For example, 79003 An Unexpected Gathering has a piece count of 652. Plugging this into the equation will give you a estimated production total for An Unexpected Gathering of
      =(-295)(652)+226,014
      = 33,674 units produced
      While this was an interesting exercise, the model has some obvious and severe restrictions. The most notable flaw is the basic premise that Lego bases production runs based on piece count. This simply isn't accurate. Another limitation is that it breaks down for sets with high piece counts. Plugging in any set greater than 766 piece count gives you a negative production number, which is impossible. We can probably assume that the mathematical model is likely a curve with limits at the y-axis, and some minimum production run quantity above the x-axis (I would guess it's 10,000 for sake of argument).
      For those that would like to play with the Excel spreadsheet I used to determine the line of best fit, I have attached it.
      WithIn the context of the controversial discussion regarding the Limited Edition 4x4 Crawler, you can see that a 20,000 unit production run is actually larger than the production run predicted by the model (which, I know, is negative - see model limitations above) based upon plausible data points. According to the model, 41999 would fall into the "negative production run" area, which means it would be in a group that would likely receive a minimum production run with a quantity based upon some breakeven production cost.
      The model works for what it is: an estimate of production quantities by model number based upon a production run. Hopefully, this has provided at least some scale and possible limits of an average lego production run. My biggest takeaway was the average production run per model of 160,000. After checking out the spreadsheet, let me know if you find any other insights or issues!
       
      ProductionRunModel.xlsx (129.56KB) : 33
    • Grolim
      Benchmarks: LEGO Technic
      This the sixth entry in a series of blogs that analyses some of the data we have available here on Brickpicker to provide some simple averages to use as benchmarks. I have done the Star Wars, Ninjago LOTR/Hobbit, City, and Super Heroes themes and this time it’s the turn of Technic!
      My aim is to provide some basic stats for the theme mainly around averages for a few simple measures relating to set sizes and value for money metrics. I’m going to leave out investment return measures such as CAGR and the various ROI time periods we have available as I think they should be a different discussion and the fact that current retail sets often muddy the results when looking at theme wide averages. I’m only going to look at US based information in regards to retail price etc.
      This information should prove useful in writing other blog articles or set reviews. It also should serve as a benchmark to be able to compare a set against the averages for its theme, which may or may not be useful but the option is there. Over time as I hope to complete more of these blog posts we might also be able to compare themes against each other.
      Technic has proved a bit tricky to look at. There are a wide variety of set types and a lot of weird and wonderful pieces that come as a set by themselves like the Power Functions parts released in 2008. These kind of “sets” throw averages off wildly as they are expensive and have very low piece counts. So I decided to include only sets with a piece count over 10. These better represent true building sets to me. There were also plenty of sets that had a $0 or unavailable retail price, mainly the very old ones as Technic is an ‘evergreen’ theme and has been around for decades. I decided to simply exclude all these $0 retail sets as well.
      Basic Information
      Even after the exclusions listed above I have gathered data on 246 Technic sets from Brickpicker set pages.
      For the Technic theme there isn’t an already well established consistent list of subthemes that I could find. So what I decided to do was to put the sets into natural groupings as much as I could, pulling out trucks, bikes, cranes, etc and leaving the rest in a catch all miscellaneous ‘Other’ group. I hope that proves to be useful in helping us see if there are any differences between the types of Technic sets and could be so if you want to compare a one particular vehicle type to the averages of its peers. Totals will give us the overall results for the whole theme.
      A note on the groupings with set counts in brackets. “Bikes” (20) contains any kind of motorbike. “Cars” (50) contain cars of course along with any type of buggy or kart. “Cranes” (13) also include things with long telescopic arms. “Digger/Loaders” (26) contain any excavators and tractors and bulldozers. “Planes/Choppers” (17) is anything that flies. “Truck” (30) is fairly obvious. The “Other” (90) category is anything that doesn’t really fit anywhere else.
      Pieces
      The average piece count per set is 373 pieces. The splits for all the groupings can be seen in the graph below.

      Retail Price
      The 246 sets have an overall average of $43.34 for retail price. Again the splits are presented below.

      You do have to take a little care in interpreting these averages as they are from such a long time span. Things like inflation not to mention wide changes in production costs (offset by efficiencies somewhat I’m sure) make prices from many years ago hard to compare to today’s environment. I can tell you though that out of the 246 sets just over half were released after the year 2000 so that’s a healthy number that keeps the averages fairly relevant still.
      Price Per Piece (PPP)
      Whether you like using PPP as a measure of value for money or not I have included it here as it has become quite a common metric for people to use. Personally I don’t put much stock in it and find it quite a blunt tool.
      The overall average for the 246 sets is $0.150 per piece. That seems a little high compared to the conventional benchmark of $0.10 per piece. There are no license fees for this evergreen in house theme to push the budget up a bit for this Lego line. Technic sets often contain specialty pieces though so you would expect that to drive prices up a little
      Price Per Gram (PPG)
      PPG is in my opinion a better indicator of retail value for money. It takes into account the amount of raw ABS plastic material you get in the box and should be a closer approximation to the cost of production of the set.
      Weights were not available for 37 of the sets. For the 209 sets that I did get weights for the overall average PPG is $0.070.
      Minifigure Count
      Well this is a section I usually put in for most themes, but it isn’t really relevant here. There are only 25 Technic sets that have a minifigure and the last of those was released back in 2001. Technic is a theme geared towards building these days and not minifigs.
      Thanks for reading and I hope you find a use for some of these numbers either in your own writing or your own investment decision making.
    • Grolim
      The differences in retail prices that Lego attracts across different countries and regions is an often talked about subject. There is always a feeling that Lego, both with its own stores and online shop and with the suggested retail prices that most big Lego retailers use, doesn’t exactly play “fair” when it comes to pricing. The reasons for that are many and varied and are beyond the scope of this article. But what I would like to do is present some evidence that may help put into perspective some of the retail pricing discrepancies.
      A couple of months ago Brickpicker expanded the information available to us to include data from 3 regions outside of the established US Ebay results. The UK, Australia (AUS), and Germany (EU) were all added to the information pages for each set. Along with the Ebay sales data we also have a small section showing the retail price of each set. It is comparing these prices that I would like to focus on.
      For the purpose of this exercise I gathered the retail prices for 345 sets released in 2011 or later across many different themes. These 345 sets had retail prices available for each of the 4 regions. There are plenty of sets that have no retail price available in one or more regions so those were excluded. 345 sets should give us plenty of coverage to examine any differences.
      To compare the prices in a meaningful way first we need to convert them to a common currency. So I took all the prices for the other three regions and converted them to US$ prices using the latest currency exchange rates as follows:

      Now all the prices are converted we can compare the averages across the 345 sets:

      From that picture you can see all the regions above the US in terms of pricing. “Aha, but wait!” some of you may be saying, “What about sales taxes like VAT?”. A very good question! Each region has a different form of sales tax added into the retail price. The UK and Germany have VAT (Value Added Tax) and Australia has GST (Goods and Services Tax). In the US the sales tax depends on which state you are in and is added on top of the retail price when you pay. Therefore to compare prices accurately we need to remove the sales tax component from the regional prices at the current rate:

      VAT was increased to 20% in the UK in 2011 so that was another reason to limit the set data to that year and after to make things easier to analyse.
      We can now look at the averages for each region with the sales taxes removed:

      Things are a lot more even now. The UK is almost identical to the US and the EU price is 5.0% higher. Aus is still up there 28.9% higher than the US though. This gives us a snapshot of how current retail market prices differ at the overall average level. I then wondered if there was any differences between themes. So here is a look at the 345 sets broken down by themes and ranked based on the variance of the average of the 3 other regions compared to the US:

      This table throws up some stark differences in the prices across the themes. You can see that Spongebob has the highest variance but only 4 sets, followed by the heavy hitting Super Heroes theme whose 18 sets are on average 28.1% higher than the US. 50.5% higher in Australia in fact! Interestingly we have the Technic set at the bottom, where apart from Australia the other 2 regions enjoy a decent discount below the US price. This is probably why the recent sales on some Technic sets at Amazon.uk have proved to be very popular with members here, with many importing them from the UK to the US at excellent prices even after shipping costs. City is another big theme where the variance is positive for those two regions as well.
      How about the best (I guess best depends on which country you are in), or highest and lowest individual sets? Starting with the lowest:
      The lowest i.e. the set with the lowest prices in other regions compared to the US goes to the 7553 City 2011 Advent Calendar which is an average 35.2% lower than the US retail price. In fact the top (bottom?) three spots are taken up by advent calendars with the 9509 SW one and the 2012 City one coming in next. The 42007 Moto-cross Bike comes in next with -20.4% difference, certainly one to look out for perhaps if another sale comes up.
      The highest i.e. the set with the highest prices in other regions compared to the US is the 6873 Spider-Man's Doc Ock Ambush set with an eye-watering 58.9% average premium in the other regions compared to the US. 6867 Loki's Cosmic Cube Escape with 57.2% and 6866 Wolverine's Chopper Showdown with 57.2% as well. So if you live outside the US and are shopping for those Super Heroes sets it look like it could be a good option to import them from the US. All dependent on what sort of retailer discounts are on and shipping/customs costs of course.
      Conclusion
      Currency exchange rates do fluctuate and these can have quite a bearing on the differences between the regional prices. For example the AUD was trading at above $US1 for quite a while earlier this year before dropping 10% in value recently. This is probably one of the main reasons that Lego prices things differently due to what currency rates they have locked in long term through hedging mechanisms etc. Because of these changes I may look to update this info perhaps quarterly or 6 monthly.
      The overall differences between the regions after sales tax removal have been less than I had envisaged. Though the swings between different themes and individual sets with them have been wider than I thought. It would seem Lego likes to price things not only on currency but what the market may bear. I’ll leave the possible reasons for another discussion or feel free to post your thoughts in the comments below.


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