Bricklink's AFOL Designer Program 2024

[TheOrcKing]

 

[StLBrian]

What are people’s thoughts about these sets for investment potential? I’ll probably be getting at least one or two for myself (depending on how they price out), but I’m thinking the lack of printed instructions will kill resale-ability; unless one can print them out yourself, which I don’t think you can do currently from then app. One **could** take a screenshot as each page is displayed, but that would take forever (and probably is inconsistent with the intent of making them only available to the owner via the app…On the flip side, though, if you sell the set the buyer technically becomes the owner and should have a right to the instructions). Thoughts?


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[Bricklectic]

Has any more information come out on box design, if instructions will be printed or only digital, and limit per person?

I've read 5 pp, not sure if that is correct. 

Is anyone planning on buying to invest in? Castle and observatory look interesting to me. But generic boxes and no printed instructions will hurt resale value

[BricksBrotha]

Im liking this castle more than the Lowenstein.  Castle and mulling between the Safe or Ship. 

As for investment, hard to gauge.  Looking at last round sales, pretty slow other than the lowenstein.  A big factor will depend on the price range all these fall into.

 

[kumas]

I dont care about investment but I definitely need the Forest Castle and Observatory for my collection

The program is limited just to these countries so there might be demand from the omitted ones

America: USA, Canada, Mexico

Europe: UK, Germany, Belgium, Italy, France, Spain, Denmark, Poland, Sweden, Netherlands, Norway, Hungary, Finland, Switzerland, Austria, Portugal, Slovenia, Ireland, Slovakia, Czechia, Luxembourg, Latvia, Estonia, Greece

Asia/Oceania: South Korea, Australia, New Zealand

Edited June 28, 2021 by kumas

[TheOrcKing]

 

[raindroplet]

I can't seem to find the info on what time we will be able to pre-order these- does anyone know? I would assume midnight EST but just want to check. What time did they go up last year?

Edit: I'm dumb and it's literally the top of the page. 8am Pacific. Misunderstood what they meant by "round opens".

Edited June 28, 2021 by raindroplet

[House Schubert]

Huh, so... no cost info before the pre-order opens?  Seems weird. 

[Alpinemaps]

So the Observatory is getting pushed back to a different round.  Which leaves us with 7 in the first round.  The first 5 to get to 3k will get produced. 

[Al Legorical]

Thoughts on how this may affect the ADP sets in value and salability?

My guess is these will be more widely advertised, but with lesser quality boxes and no instructions, may spark renewed interest in the original ADP sets.

Be nice, been sitting on those hoping this would come about

[Bricklectic]

20 minutes ago, Al Legorical said:

 

My guess is these will be more widely advertised, but with lesser quality boxes

Whats your source on the lesser quality boxes, havent seen anything on that

[Al Legorical]

3 hours ago, Bricklectic said:

Whats your source on the lesser quality boxes, havent seen anything on that

Most recently you.

Is anyone planning on buying to invest in? Castle and observatory look interesting to me. But generic boxes and no printed instructions will hurt resale value

[Bricklectic]

2 minutes ago, Al Legorical said:

Most recently you.

Is anyone planning on buying to invest in? Castle and observatory look interesting to me. But generic boxes and no printed instructions will hurt resale value

meant it more relative to the official lego boxes. In any case I was wrong - the 2019 boxes were very nice and I'd be very happy with a similar design. But I am not seeing in any articles that they necessarily are changing the 2019 design for this year. Hopefully it will be the same,

[$20 on joe vs dan]

1 hour ago, Bricklectic said:

meant it more relative to the official lego boxes. In any case I was wrong - the 2019 boxes were very nice and I'd be very happy with a similar design. But I am not seeing in any articles that they necessarily are changing the 2019 design for this year. Hopefully it will be the same,

Not sure and I can't find the original articles, but I remember BL saying that they would likely go w/ lesser packaging as it was a huge drain in 2019. We already know that there's no printed directions.

Also the obvious for me is that there's no info on the boxes and we are less than 24hrs before the buy period...this falls in line w/ basic marketing principles...hold back negative info as long as possible and hope that hype will overcome the defficiencies...don't want to turn off any potential buyers early on.  I dare say we won't get packaging info until well past the commitment period. 

[DadsAFOL]

The nice boxes were sourced by BL pre-acquisition in California. TLG is going to be producing the sets this time, possibly in Billund, so it will be interesting to see what they do. The hand-produced small run GWP have those cheesy yellow boxes but these sets are too large for that type of packaging. My guess is something more like the Inside Tour sets.


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[spener90]

They postponed the observatory until later stages. I think given the limited information I will likely be in for just 1 boat and 1 castle. Price points may change this though. Still happy to have one of the previous castles that I picked off eBay for $210 used.

[raindroplet]

The lack of a dedicated box and instructions tells me that there's not a lot of reason to invest in these. I'm sure they'll see gain, but not enough to fret over if I can't get one. It's probably my bias showing but I only expect bionicle to see any increase in value, since the fanbase is rabid and it's basically a pseudo-licensed set. 

Edit: The customer limit is FIVE??? That's insane. A single person can order 1/1000 of the stock. 

Edited June 30, 2021 by raindroplet

[Al Legorical]

11 hours ago, raindroplet said:

The lack of a dedicated box and instructions tells me that there's not a lot of reason to invest in these. I'm sure they'll see gain, but not enough to fret over if I can't get one. It's probably my bias showing but I only expect bionicle to see any increase in value, since the fanbase is rabid and it's basically a pseudo-licensed set. 

Edit: The customer limit is FIVE??? That's insane. A single person can order 1/1000 of the stock. 

ADP was 3 per and they got stuck with a load to offload thru the "wholesale offer" which was unlimited qty - they still had some left over of the less popular creations. Probably looking to resellers  to buy in at max qty.

[Al Legorical]

12 hours ago, DadsAFOL said:

The nice boxes were sourced by BL pre-acquisition in California. TLG is going to be producing the sets this time, possibly in Billund, so it will be interesting to see what they do. The hand-produced small run GWP have those cheesy yellow boxes but these sets are too large for that type of packaging. My guess is something more like the Inside Tour sets.


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so no inside info from you? Or is that guess "close"?

[Al Legorical]

If the price/part is reasonable will be my deciding factor. Boat according to designer has "rare parts"

lets see if they reveal packaging with the opening of the offer.

says there are 8 sets in this round is the eighth going to be a surprise? I only see 7

shame there's no printed instructions, the ADP sets were quality

[BricksBrotha]

17 minutes ago, Al Legorical said:

ADP was 3 per and they got stuck with a load to offload thru the "wholesale offer" which was unlimited qty - they still had some left over of the less popular creations. 

Wasnt the last round limited to US customers only? I believe I saw somewhere the list of 40 or so countries this will be available.  The amount of eyes on these sets have increased exponentially since the last round. 

[Al Legorical]

Just noticed the station "Studgate" looks very similar to something that keeps showing up on Amazon by a clone brand

 

[BricksBrotha]

9 minutes ago, Al Legorical said:

If the price/part is reasonable will be my deciding factor. Boat according to designer has "rare parts"

lets see if they reveal packaging with the opening of the offer.

says there are 8 sets in this round is the eighth going to be a surprise? I only see 7

shame there's no printed instructions, the ADP sets were quality

12 posts above your question...

19 hours ago, Alpinemaps said:

So the Observatory is getting pushed back to a different round.  Which leaves us with 7 in the first round.  The first 5 to get to 3k will get produced. 

 

[Al Legorical]

1 minute ago, BricksBrotha said:

Wasnt the last round limited to US customers only? I believe I saw somewhere the list of 40 or so countries this will be available.  The amount of eyes on these sets have increased exponentially since the last round. 

I don't think so, it was just everything shipped from Cali, which stung Euro buyers with charges

[raindroplet]

They mentioned in one of the FAQs that they were allocating stock for the domestic LEGO sites in each region, so it's entirely possible that stock is gated by where you live. Obviously the US is probably gonna be much more competitive than a smaller Lego-lovin' country.