Ideas #011: 21304 - Doctor Who

[Frank Brickowski]

1 hour ago, Val-E said:

Didn´t harm the Delorean. I just feel that Dr Who and TBBT are far too niche to make the gains of that set. Same applies to the Caterham - it´s no Porsche.

Movie-licensed sets are a different story than TV-series-licensed sets. For TV series it's much harder to stand the test of time or even become a classic. The DeLorean had never been in need of anything new running on TV or in cinemas for the set to gain value post-EOL. The movie trilogy from 25 years ago is a classic and will always be enough to drive interest. Look at what went on with the SW line when there were no new movies (sellers' target audience being AFOLS) for many years. For TV series it just doesn't work the same way. For these sets it IS important to have something running at the moment or something new coming up.

However the Doctor Who set being labeled as Retiring Soon in SEPTEMBER says it all, for me it's not hard to imagine it will yet make it to the end of the year sale... All non-UK sellers should avoid this without exception. In Germany the TV series is more or less non-existent. 3 sets sold on Ebay in the last 3 months... This set is like an open grave for any dollar invested - easy to fall in, extremely hard to get out. I agree with you that TBBT is likely to be just as unsuccessful for LEGO as Dr. Who.

Edited September 27, 2016 by Frank Brickowski

[Will 4]

1 hour ago, Val-E said:

I got one last xmas for 35 euros and I think I´ll hold. Not a huge market for this here and all the UK ebayers who got it cheap will be flooding the market with their devalued currency for months to come.

Ah Brexit economics

[Val-E]

4 minutes ago, Will 4 said:

Ah Brexit economics

The way things are going, big Big Ben will retire before it actually happens - maybe even TB too!

[Manse1001]

I agree this set is no Delorean but imo it's not to be overlooked. I was in London a while back and stumbled across a shop dedicated to Dr. Who memorabilia, and it was busy, not many TV series can pull that off. Yes it maybe a surprise early retirement but as mentioned within the last few pages, this can be down to various reasons, licence, paying the designer not necessarily lack of interest. Personally I don't think it can be compared to tbbt, in the UK I believe it's much more popular. I however do agree with the above, for non UK investors I'd avoid, but in the UK I think it carries a big fan base some of which are also likely to be AFOLs. As with all sets buy smart and sale at the right time and I think there is money to be made.

[biking_tiger]

Sorry, but Doctor Who ran from 1963-89, and now again since 2005. Arguing that Doctor Who is "just a TV show" is silly. There's a huge cult following, and guys like me who remember Tom Baker as the Doctor (from the 70s-early 80s), simply had to buy this set on sight. My stepson's high school has a Doctor Who club. We have a student at school who regularly wears her Tardis dress. If "you" don't get it, fine, but DW isn't really to be dismissed. 

This is right up there with those who want to argue the Mystery Machine isn't going anywhere because Scooby Doo is "just a TV cartoon." 

Oh well... don't buy this set. Don't buy any at all. 

[Rodeogeorge]

A Tom Baker doctor would be tops. With a fabric scarf piece.

[Frank Brickowski]

6 hours ago, biking_tiger said:

Sorry, but Doctor Who ran from 1963-89, and now again since 2005. Arguing that Doctor Who is "just a TV show" is silly. There's a huge cult following, and guys like me who remember Tom Baker as the Doctor (from the 70s-early 80s), simply had to buy this set on sight. My stepson's high school has a Doctor Who club. We have a student at school who regularly wears her Tardis dress. If "you" don't get it, fine, but DW isn't really to be dismissed. 

This is right up there with those who want to argue the Mystery Machine isn't going anywhere because Scooby Doo is "just a TV cartoon." 

Oh well... don't buy this set. Don't buy any at all. 

In Germany there is a popular TV series called "Lindenstraße" that has been running for like 3 or 4 decades or so and still going strong, it also has a cult following. Yet outside of Germany nobody cares about or has even ever heard of it. Get my point? Doctor Who is just too little of a GLOBAL phenomenon to be that successful as a LEGO set. Look at Marvel's Avengers, not even THIS license has the potential to be a hit in all the markets worldwide.

But OK, I'll just be more precise: Anyone outside the UK or the US should avoid this set.

By the way I didn't say that TV series don't work at all as LEGO sets. I just said it is much harder for them to succeed. And judging by the September Retiring Soon tag for the Dr. Who set, there is a strong indication that at least LEGO fans simply don't care as much about Dr. Who as you would like them to.

Edited September 28, 2016 by Frank Brickowski

[fantomas007]

This is very hard issue for non-UK investors. I dont know anybody in my country, who is a fan of this serie, and I havent noticed this serie in our TV. Its far from legendary movies or TV series such as Ghostbusters, BTTF, Knight rider, James Bond, etc. Even the story of Dr. Who is strange for me (maybe its special British humor). So its very hard to decide, whether to buy some pieces as investment or not. I can imagine that future UK demand will be strongly covered by local investors, so I can compete just in other markets. But hard to predict, how many AFOLs will want this set. Is here a non-UK or non-US fan of this serie?

Ideas is a very complicated theme for investments... Every set is completely different, for different fans, and it is not a serie of compact sets fitting each other, as modulars. Some of them exploded after EOL, some are a trap (exosuit). Plus, the production life of the sets is a mass - some are living 1 year, some 2 years, some are neverending (Ecto). I remember buying the Birds for 20 % above MRSP after immediate EOL in Europe, while in USA it was alive for another year, which ruined my investment... So I am extremly careful in Ideas investments...

[Sprocket77]

57 minutes ago, Frank Brickowski said:

In Germany there is a popular TV series called "Lindenstraße" that has been running for like 3 or 4 decades or so and still going strong, it also has a cult following. Yet outside of Germany nobody cares about or has even ever heard of it. Get my point? Doctor Who is just too little of a GLOBAL phenomenon to be that successful as a LEGO set. Look at Marvel's Avengers, not even THIS license has the potential to be a hit in all the markets worldwide.

But OK, I'll just be more precise: Anyone outside the UK or the US should avoid this set.

By the way I didn't say that TV series don't work at all as LEGO sets. I just said it is much harder for them to succeed. And judging by the September Retiring Soon tag for the Dr. Who set, there is a strong indication that at least LEGO fans simply don't care as much about Dr. Who as you would like them to.

Doctor Who is a cult scifi show, rather than just being a cult British show.

Every country has their cult show like Lindenstrabe which means nothing outside of their country, the UK has them too, like Coronation Street, but Doctor Who is different. 

2.3m watched the last Christmas special in the US. Just to give you a comparison, the last season premiere of Mad Men had 2.27m viewers.

[Val-E]

6 hours ago, biking_tiger said:

Sorry, but Doctor Who ran from 1963-89, and now again since 2005. Arguing that Doctor Who is "just a TV show" is silly. There's a huge cult following, and guys like me who remember Tom Baker as the Doctor (from the 70s-early 80s), simply had to buy this set on sight. My stepson's high school has a Doctor Who club. We have a student at school who regularly wears her Tardis dress. If "you" don't get it, fine, but DW isn't really to be dismissed. 

This is right up there with those who want to argue the Mystery Machine isn't going anywhere because Scooby Doo is "just a TV cartoon." 

Oh well... don't buy this set. Don't buy any at all. 

99.9% of the world´s population don´t know or care who Tom Baker is so really it´s appeal is going to be limited to a minority of the UK population that likes Dr Who and an equally small number of international Dr Who fans. That´s not a slight on the show at all, it´s just putting in perspective the demand that this set will have and probably also explains its short shelf life. If you are buying in the UK and selling in the UK, it´s a set that will perform as well as any other due to the expected short shelf life.

There was the same argument over Birds, but in that case it was the other way around - there is a substantially wider worldwide fan base for them and that set was pretty hard to find as it was almost always on backorderd and not sold outwith SAH in many European countries.

Edited September 28, 2016 by Val-E

[botchy123]

Dr Who was first shown the day after Kennedy was shot and is watched by 100 million people in over 50 countries worldwide. It has a huge fan base of Toy Collectors which has been on the go a lot longer than Lego "investors " have.

The 50th anniversary episode was watched by 110,000,000 people simultaneously around the world, which is a world record for a drama i think.

Believe it or not some crazy people buy it as an investment.

 

[Val-E]

2 minutes ago, Sprocket77 said:

Doctor Who is a cult scifi show, rather than just being a cult British show.

Every country has their cult show like Lindenstrabe which means nothing outside of their country, the UK has them too, like Coronation Street, but Doctor Who is different. 

2.3m watched the last Christmas special in the US. Just to give you a comparison, the last season premiere of Mad Men had 2.27m viewers.

We definitely need a Rover´s Return Ideas set, or pehaps a full modular line of houses with all the Coronation Street characters!

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Just now, botchy123 said:

Dr Who was first shown the day after Kennedy was shot and is watched by 100 million people in over 50 countries worldwide. It has a huge fan base of Toy Collectors which has been on the go a lot longer than Lego "investors " have.

The 50th anniversary episode was watched by 110,000,000 people simultaneously around the world, which is a world record for a drama i think.

Believe it or not some crazy people buy it as an investment.

 

 

[Val-E]

IIRC, it went to backorder for quite a bit on release, but it has been pretty much constantly available since then. Here. it´s available in a major chain too. How is distribution in other European countries?

[HandyHand]

44 minutes ago, fantomas007 said:

Ideas is a very complicated theme for investments... Every set is completely different, for different fans, and it is not a serie of compact sets fitting each other, as modulars. Some of them exploded after EOL, some are a trap (exosuit). Plus, the production life of the sets is a mass - some are living 1 year, some 2 years, some are neverending (Ecto). I remember buying the Birds for 20 % above MRSP after immediate EOL in Europe, while in USA it was alive for another year, which ruined my investment... So I am extremly careful in Ideas investments...

As said before, the Ideas series is indeed a complicated theme for investments. Every individual set needs to be evaluated separately regarding its general appeal, unique bricks/pieces in the set, value for money, future expected demand, and duration of production. One of the main attractions of Ideas sets is the lack of stickers. The printed bricks and the more luxurious boxes and instruction manuals also give more class than the regular City/Friends/Creator sets.

I also don't believe LEGO follows the strategy of the consoles makers (Sony and Microsoft) to sell the first batches of consoles at a loss to only make a profit on later production runs. When LEGO produces a set it will be sold at a price that will at the very least break even for LEGO, after subtracting licensing fee and in the case of Ideas sets, the 1% fee to the original designer. If the set sells well they'll produce additional badges until the demand tops off. If the set doesn't sell well they'll just stop producing, sell off the remaining sets of the production run, and move on. 

Regarding the early retirement of this Doctor Who set: I don't think it's unthinkable at all that LEGO got a 1 year license deal with the BBC to produce and sell this set. IF that is actually the case we should also see the end of the Lego Dimensions sets related to Doctor Who: 71204 Doctor Who Level Pack, and 71238 Cyberman Fun Pack. With the 2nd generation of Dimensions waves coming out now the first generation of Dimensions waves could well get retired. Including those Doctor Who related sets.

 

Quote

IIRC, it went to backorder for quite a bit on release, but it has been pretty much constantly available since then. Here. it´s available in a major chain too. How is distribution in other European countries?

Like all recent Ideas sets it has not been available in any major chain of toy stores here in The Netherlands. The only way to get the Doctor Who set below the LEGO RRP price was through Amazon (UK/IT/FR/SP) sites.

Edited September 28, 2016 by Haay

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5 minutes ago, Haay said:

Regarding the early retirement of this Doctor Who set: I don't think it's unthinkable at all that LEGO got a 1 year license deal with the BBC to produce and sell this set. IF that is actually the case we should also see the end of the Lego Dimensions sets related to Doctor Who: 71204 Doctor Who Level Pack, and 71238 Cyberman Fun Pack. With the 2nd generation of Dimensions waves coming out now the first generation of Dimensions waves could well get retired. Including those Doctor Who related sets.

I’ve a suspicion that the production was planned prior to the announcement that there wouldn’t be a season this year.    The lack of a season this year has no doubt lead to the reduced demand, discounting and retirement.  This may not effect the dimensions sets.  

[Frank Brickowski]

1 hour ago, botchy123 said:

Dr Who was first shown the day after Kennedy was shot and is watched by 100 million people in over 50 countries worldwide. It has a huge fan base of Toy Collectors which has been on the go a lot longer than Lego "investors " have.

The 50th anniversary episode was watched by 110,000,000 people simultaneously around the world, which is a world record for a drama i think.

Believe it or not some crazy people buy it as an investment.

 

I AM in fact a sci-fi fan but hadn't heard about Dr. Who for the first 30 years of my life. No big surprise as in Germany the show did not make it to even being broadcast until 1989 and was not shown for very long from there. Some newer seasons were shown starting in 2008 and had a very weak viewership. Nowadays the series only runs on Pay-TV which is only a tiny fraction of the German TV market. So, while Dr. Who is a classic in the USA, Canada, UK, Australia and New Zealand (according to Wikipedia), there are other markets where really nobody knows the show - so the title "Dr. Who"(?) can be taken 100% literally there. I don't recall too many other TV series cases with such a hard international viewership "division", but it's just like that.

Invest in Dr. Who LEGO sets in Germany if you like, but nobody will buy them from you, not matter how long you are ready to wait for the value to rise. It won't.

[Richie T]

So for UK based guys, what kind of buy in do we think is acceptable on this, I haven't followed it much so haven't seen how deeply discounted it has been to date?

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7 minutes ago, Richie T said:

So for UK based guys, what kind of buy in do we think is acceptable on this, I haven't followed it much so haven't seen how deeply discounted it has been to date?

It’s been very readily available at £35.  Lower than that in large quantities has likely sailed.  £30 at this stage in the game is probably good enough. I wouldn’t go anywhere near RRP. 

 

[Richie T]

Ok cool, good to get a sense as to where it has been.

[legochris]

Even at £35 I'm not sure I'd go for it at all. BL isn't so bad, but last time I looked on eBay there were an awful lot for sale, heavily discounted and as there were so many that means there are so many more that people havent even bothered listing them. I've started parting out just to get a small return and roll that money into other things. It's a shame, it's a nice set, just can't see it doing very well from an investment perspective.

Edited September 28, 2016 by legochris

[Fenix_2k1]

I picked all mine up at 30 or less. @TabbyBoy has picked up a lot even cheaper than that. 

Argos have it in 3 for 2 offer for delivery but you risk trashed boxes. Tesco still have it at £35 but I'm willing to bet it will be OOS there by end of the day.  

Edited September 28, 2016 by Fenix_2k1

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10 minutes ago, legochris said:

Even at £35 I'm not sure I'd go for it at all. BL isn't so bad, but last time I looked on eBay there were an awful lot for sale, heavily discounted and as there were so many that means there are so many more that people havent even bothered listing them. I've started parting out just to get a small return and roll that money into other things. It's a shame, it's a nice set, just can't see it doing very well from an investment perspective.

It’s still in production and widely available in retail at £35 or less.  What were you expecting eBay to show?

[GiliusThunderhead]

First off I do LOVE this set.  But if you look at cammelcammelcammel after the first month this has pretty much been on a permanent discount.  
With the relatively low buy in and the “returning soon tag” (which has also been flagged on HDUK) it makes it an easy set for the masses to pick up in small numbers (so I do think they’ll be a lot of supply).

That’s what would worry me the most on this one.  Other than on its initial release I’ve never seen it OOS.
I think this set will do well – its Lego and Dr Who.  Great display value and a good one for cult fans who might own just this one Lego set and are done.  Won’t be a BTTF.

If there’s no new series until later in 2017/2018 then holding to then is where the real gains I suspect will happen when it gets pushed back into the lime light.

[legochris]

1 minute ago, feed said:

It’s still in production and widely available in retail at £35 or less.  What were you expecting eBay to show?

There are plenty of discounted sets in production on eBay without the massive volume that 21304 has, so it showed exactly what I expected, lots of stock to shift, plenty of better places to invest.