LEGO to replace plastic bags with paper bags

[CosmicSpeed]

This is packaging excellence. Even though the product is still essentially petroleum based, its good to see changes in the packaging, making it 100% recyclable. 

https://brickset.com/article/53790/plastic-bags-inside-sets-to-be-replaced-with-paper-ones

 

Edited September 15, 2020 by CosmicSpeed

[minicoopers11]

4 minutes ago, CosmicSpeed said:

This is packaging excellence. Even though the product is still essentially petroleum based, its good to see changes in the packaging, making it 100& recyclable. 

https://brickset.com/article/53790/plastic-bags-inside-sets-to-be-replaced-with-paper-ones

 

A. Absolutely.

B. I've always hated the plastic bags (especially the ones without numbers ). So glad they're going away.

[spener90]

9 minutes ago, minicoopers11 said:

A. Absolutely.

B. I've always hated the plastic bags (especially the ones without numbers ). So glad they're going away.

This is fantastic. I've really started to hate that they use plastic bags inside them, as I try to recycle as much as possible, and my area doesn't take those though. It will actually make me so much happier opening something and being able to drop the paper bags immediately into the bin.

[MotorCityMuscle]

1 minute ago, spener90 said:

This is fantastic. I've really started to hate that they use plastic bags inside them, as I try to recycle as much as possible, and my area doesn't take those though. It will actually make me so much happier opening something and being able to drop the paper bags immediately into the bin.

agree and should have been done a long time ago

and whatever happened to making the switchover to plant based bricks? 

[exracer327]

51 minutes ago, CosmicSpeed said:

This is packaging excellence. Even though the product is still essentially petroleum based, its good to see changes in the packaging, making it 100% recyclable. 

https://brickset.com/article/53790/plastic-bags-inside-sets-to-be-replaced-with-paper-ones

 

Recycling plastic is a challenge so this is definitely an improvement. 

However, say good bye to identifying sets by their unopened bags or even knowing which unopened bags go with which set.

[brickvoyeur]

27 minutes ago, exracer327 said:

Recycling plastic is a challenge so this is definitely an improvement. 

However, say good bye to identifying sets by their unopened bags or even knowing which unopened bags go with which set.

Sounds like printing the set number on the bag itself would make a lot of sense. Easier to print it on a paper bag than on plastic. 

[exracer327]

1 minute ago, brickvoyeur said:

Sounds like printing the set number on the bag itself would make a lot of sense. Easier to print it on a paper bag than on plastic. 

I agree, printing the set number on the bag would work.  It is curious why they don't do that now.  Obviously it would be more ink and another function that needs to be programmed for producing bags.  Not much but it'll add to the bottom line for every bag produced.

[Phil B]

16 minutes ago, exracer327 said:

I agree, printing the set number on the bag would work.  It is curious why they don't do that now.  Obviously it would be more ink and another function that needs to be programmed for producing bags.  Not much but it'll add to the bottom line for every bag produced.

Not the expert here, but I think they order/produce the plastic for these bags as a huge pre-printed roll. That's why it carries only generic info (Number of the bag, part number for the bag, copyright notice when the bag design was made etc). They merge the bag roll with the sorter output, seal the bottom, fill the bag, cut the top and seal the top. No customization.

It's likely these paper bags will go through the same process. If they do have a printer further downstream, it would indeed be much easier to print a unique code on a bag (or a set number) as printing on paper is much more durable than printing on plastic (which requires highly specialized UV printers AFAIK).

Whether LEGO will do this is of course only known to them .... the images I saw did not show a set number on the bags.

Edited September 15, 2020 by Phil B

[keymomachine]

My wife was excited to share this new paper bag information with me before I'd read this thread. I see lots of positives, I hate the plastic bags, but they have their advantages, seeing what's in them is really nice. Also if you have a water event they protect the contents better and you can still sell the set as new w/o box. That said, I hate throwing away the bags, feels really wasteful.

[Mark Twain]

1 hour ago, exracer327 said:

Recycling plastic is a challenge so this is definitely an improvement. 

However, say good bye to identifying sets by their unopened bags or even knowing which unopened bags go with which set.

Or to check and see if some returns a bag without the contents or switches contents with a bag from another set. 

[spener90]

10 minutes ago, Mark Twain said:

Or to check and see if some returns a bag without the contents or switches contents with a bag from another set. 

Here's to hoping that Lego will begin to put something along the lines of bag 7/8, bag 8/8. And even put on the bag the set number as well as name.

As someone who can think like a criminal (but would never act on the ideas), I have looked at products before and thought about how easy it would theoretically be get away with shady things. If you are reading this Lego (😠), please go about doing this right!

[Phil B]

9 minutes ago, spener90 said:

Here's to hoping that Lego will begin to put something along the lines of bag 7/8, bag 8/8. And even put on the bag the set number as well as name.

As someone who can think like a criminal (but would never act on the ideas), I have looked at products before and thought about how easy it would theoretically be get away with shady things. If you are reading this Lego (😠), please go about doing this right!

LEGO would only do this if this was a problem for retailers. I don't think retailers care, so it is unlikely LEGO will implement this.

[exracer327]

9 minutes ago, Phil B said:

LEGO would only do this if this was a problem for retailers. I don't think retailers care, so it is unlikely LEGO will implement this.

I was in WalMart the other day and saw a couple of D-Os up high on the shelf.  Having read about others finding deep sale prices I checked one.  As I picked it up, it sounded funny to me.  As it's the first D-O I have ever picked up, I didn't think much about it until I noticed the seals had been re-taped and not in a good way.  I picked up the second one and sure enough the second had the sound of sealed bags and I suspect was actually lighter than the first.

Retailers have a problem with fraud, so does LEGO.  It could be countered by LEGO printing the set number + bag number on every bag.  I just wonder if there is enough fraud to justify the increased cost of printing more info on the bags.

Of course, if the retailers just accept the product back after it's been opened and never check inside, well then they'll still be stuck with it.

Edited September 15, 2020 by exracer327

[iahawks550]

Retailers won't take the time to see how many bags are there and required. There is almost zero way to prevent this type of fraud. Possibly some sort of punch tab instead of seals, but re-gluing is also an issue. 

[$20 on joe vs dan]

58 minutes ago, exracer327 said:

I was in WalMart the other day and saw a couple of D-Os up high on the shelf.  Having read about others finding deep sale prices I checked one.  As I picked it up, it sounded funny to me.  As it's the first D-O I have ever picked up, I didn't think much about it until I noticed the seals had been re-taped and not in a good way.  I picked up the second one and sure enough the second had the sound of sealed bags and I suspect was actually lighter than the first.

Retailers have a problem with fraud, so does LEGO.  It could be countered by LEGO printing the set number + bag number on every bag.  I just wonder if there is enough fraud to justify the increased cost of printing more info on the bags.

Of course, if the retailers just accept the product back after it's been opened and never check inside, well then they'll still be stuck with it.

how about a giant bag sealing all the smaller bag?  easy enough to check by even the lowest denominator clerk.

[BricksBrotha]

3 hours ago, spener90 said:

It will actually make me so much happier opening something and being able to drop the paper bags immediately into the BURN PILE. 

 

 

[joch29]

am I the only one thinking when I saw this pic that they should have a bunch of adults in a test group thinking how a criminal would try to take advantage of the switch.

 

On a similar note, anyone else notice the poor glue seal job on the box of some of these new sets?  I had to glue some shut.

Edited September 15, 2020 by joch29

[MotorCityMuscle]

not gonna have that notorious lego bag sound anymore when you testing a "sealed" box

[KShine]

The paper bags look terrible/cheap compared to the trans clear plastic ones which allow the shiny new pieces, etc. to be seen. They will need to work on creating a trans clear (or nearly so) bag before moving forward.

I don't expect that they can do anything to try duplicating that great sound experience you get while dumping the old bags out of a fresh box of LEGO.

It will also make buying/selling loose bags or open boxed sets incredibly difficult.

Edited September 15, 2020 by KShine

[thedingman5]

^ Open box, sealed bags will no longer be viable without some form of on-bag printing (and even that won’t be full-proof).  Have to hope that the tape seals hold for those long holds!!!!

Edited September 15, 2020 by thedingman5