10211 - Grand Emporium

[tractorboy]

If Lego's growth in China continues (it grew 40% in 2015), we might have to get used to shipping retired modulars over there. It could get interesting if millions of Chinese Lego fans decide they must have that GE and TH for their collections.

[Ciglione]

11 minutes ago, stephen_rockefeller said:

Why not?

Cause we might be nearing the time that people will not come back from their dark lego ages. I mean specifically the time when Lego was in crisis due to them producing boring sets and lacking creativity. They were almost bankrupt. So there can be a time hole in the growth.

[stephen_rockefeller]

1 minute ago, Ciglione said:

Cause we might be nearing the time that people will not come back from their dark lego ages. I mean specifically the time when Lego was in crisis due to them producing boring sets and lacking creativity. They were almost bankrupt. So there can be a time hole in the growth.

Far fetched but I guess anything can happen.

[Ciglione]

1 minute ago, stephen_rockefeller said:

Far fetched but I guess anything can happen.

Maybe it is far fetched. But it can be a factor. The truth is. No one knows for sure. But one needs to calculate using all the factors.

[HandyHand]

I doubt that will play a big role, @Ciglione. The biggest factor contributing to people coming back to Lego from their Lego Dark Ages is simply because kids who play with Lego usually feel that Lego is a kids' toy when they're in their late teenager years. They don't have the money yet to buy the advanced Lego sets, they don't have their own house yet to display those sets, and they're more into videogames, the dating-game, finding their path into adulthood. Then when the dust settles and they've landed a decent job, live on their own instead of with their parents, maybe have a partner and have kids themselves, they suddenly have their eyes opened to the wonderful sets they missed during those Dark Ages and they want to catch up. 

I think: as long as kids play with Lego now (and since Lego is more popular now than ever before), these kids will go through a Lego Dark Ages period, and a percentage of them will return to Lego to become an AFOL. So our future actually looks bright!  

[Rodeogeorge]

What's this Bubble talk? I want to read about the grand emporium.

[asharerin]

6 hours ago, Haay said:

A LEGO city built around these advanced modular buildings can easily use multiple copies of the PS!

Plenty use 2 or 3 copies of GE to add extra floors for their layouts as well. It is also a corner which makes it that much better.

PS is harder to extend vertically but you are right plenty use multiple sets to expand their city in between the other modulars.

PS will do fine in time, just a lot longer time than the other sets. I don't see the popularity of the modular theme going away anytime soon.

[BrickLegacy]

4 hours ago, Ciglione said:

Cause we might be nearing the time that people will not come back from their dark lego ages. I mean specifically the time when Lego was in crisis due to them producing boring sets and lacking creativity. They were almost bankrupt. So there can be a time hole in the growth.

There is probably some truth to that, but also remember that people are having babies later in life.  An AFOL that grew up in the 80s might be having their first child soon and that child won't be getting their first LEGO set until they are 4 or 5.  We have a while before the children of the 80s stop having babies.

[Val-E]

I´m sure we´ll find a way to get the Zika virus into this thread too!

Fact is this set, along with FB, is one of the first mass scale hoarded sets and that right now there is way, way, way too much supply versus demand. This will keep a cap on prices for at least another year as FB is in the same spot and was retired one year earlier with a similar shelf life.

When FB starts to appreciate again, we can predict a timeline for GE, probably delayed by 6-12 months as even more GE´s were hoarded.

[MarleyMoose]

Beware of Zika tainted Lego from S. American sellers.

[fossilrock]

7 hours ago, Ciglione said:

I agree with your first statement.

However, I believe your second statement is too predictive. The AFOL community will not keep on growing forever. 

I disagree.  I think the AFOL community will keep in flux.  As long as people have kids, and they have kids, the potential for AFOL's will always be there.  There will always be a new crop of kids wanting toys to play with, and Lego is one heck of a good toy to give a kid.  Then usually adults get sucked into it to.  Having a kid definitely brought myself, as an adult into this plastic game.

[Val-E]

1 minute ago, fossilrock said:

I disagree.  I think the AFOL community will keep in flux.  As long as people have kids, and they have kids, the potential for AFOL's will always be there.  There will always be a new crop of kids wanting toys to play with, and Lego is one heck of a good toy to give a kid.  Then usually adults get sucked into it to.  Having a kid definitely brought myself, as an adult into this plastic game.

Times change, people change, habits change. The AFOL is a relatively new breed in Lego´s timeline as are little girls. We have no way of knowing whether this will be sustained medium to long term.

Are people hoarding Brick Bank massively? I should hope not as the gains from modulars are clearly decreasing (TH treated as an exception).

 

[cubfan78]

I think Lego is probably way ahead of us and realizes the market potential overseas and here in the US with awakened AFOLs. I would not be surprised if they ramp up production and start creating new Theme's and even bring back a couple retired modulars. 

[fossilrock]

37 minutes ago, cubfan78 said:

I think Lego is probably way ahead of us and realizes the market potential overseas and here in the US with awakened AFOLs. I would not be surprised if they ramp up production and start creating new Theme's and even bring back a couple retired modulars. 

I doubt they do that.

[fossilrock]

45 minutes ago, Val-E said:

Times change, people change, habits change. The AFOL is a relatively new breed in Lego´s timeline as are little girls. We have no way of knowing whether this will be sustained medium to long term.

Are people hoarding Brick Bank massively? I should hope not as the gains from modulars are clearly decreasing (TH treated as an exception).

 

You're eternally pessimistic though.  The two sets since TH have already doubled since retirement, which is a little over a year ago.  So, I don't think things are as bad as you constantly say. 

The Brick Bank is pretty dang awesome looking.  I haven't built or bought one yet, but it's definitely one of the best modular buildings made.  I think it's better than market street, and the Green Grocer by far, and I could see it doing well when it does retire, and time passes on. 

The only thing I would fear as an investor is not lego itself, but the advent and advancement of 3d printing in China, as well as other emerging markets over the next decade.

[Val-E]

7 minutes ago, fossilrock said:

You're eternally pessimistic though.  The two sets since TH have already doubled since retirement, which is a little over a year ago.  So, I don't think things are as bad as you constantly say. 

The Brick Bank is pretty dang awesome looking.  I haven't built or bought one yet, but it's definitely one of the best modular buildings made.  I think it's better than market street, and the Green Grocer by far, and I could see it doing well when it does retire, and time passes on. 

The only thing I would fear as an investor is not lego itself, but the advent and advancement of 3d printing in China, as well as other emerging markets over the next decade.

I sure am but I think it is with good criteria as the figures don´t lie. It is worth noting that the bulk of GE´s game came in the 4 months after its retirement. Since then, appreciation has been negligible. See most other 2014 retirements that are not Star Wars and the trend is apparent.

We already have a clone of Brick Bank and it´s only a matter of time before someone does GE and all the other classics again - maybe it will be TLG themselves.

The proof of the pudding will be what happens when PS finally goes. How much of a bump will it have compared to GE and FB?

 

[fossilrock]

In my assessment, I don't think it will rise up very fast, but over time will be a solid investment.  I think it will be a slow grind for too many, but it's dependent on people's patience and how long they are willing to hold something. 

I think the modular line has a long while to go before it begins to repeat.  IMO, they still could make a post office, bakery, police station, sushi house, candy shop, funhouse, daycare, armory/recruiting station, arcade, coffee shop etc.   Heck, I could easily see this line going 10 to 15 years before having to repeat on some of the older sets. 

So, if you look at it that way, the Pet Shop will be a great invesetment if this line goes past 2020, and they only make one a year. 

I think you are wanting to see every set achieve town hall type growth instantly.  You need to look at the bigger picture, and at it with a more long term view.

 

Edited June 2, 2016 by fossilrock

[asharerin]

2 minutes ago, Val-E said:

I sure am but I think it is with good criteria as the figures don´t lie. It is worth noting that the bulk of GE´s game came in the 4 months after its retirement. Since then, appreciation has been negligible.

 

I have to disagree. From Jan 2016 to present GE  increased from $270 FBA to $360 FBA, and is still climbing. I would not call a 33% bump in 5 months negligible.

Not sure about other platforms or markets tho the price could well be flat in your part of the world.

[Val-E]

5 minutes ago, asharerin said:

I have to disagree. From Jan 2016 to present GE  increased from $270 FBA to $360 FBA, and is still climbing. I would not call a 33% bump in 5 months negligible.

Not sure about other platforms or markets tho the price could well be flat in your part of the world.

Yes, different countries, different growth patterns. GE has certanly done better than the more expensive AA so it´s by no means an investment disaster and as I usually sell most of my stock at double buy-in, I only have one GE and one FB left.

[thirsty]

I would be willing to bet that a good 20% of my ebay auctions are won by Asians (Chinese) with postal forwarding addresses in US or Canada.  Almost always, rare bigger exclusives.

 

I've sold off 5-6 GE's and I would say half are to Asia.

Edited June 2, 2016 by thirsty
Forgot something

[tractorboy]

3 minutes ago, thirsty said:

I would be willing to bet that a good 20% of my ebay auctions are won by Asians (Chinese) with postal forwarding addresses in US or Canada.  Almost always, rare bigger exclusives.

That's interesting. How do you know they are Chinese, by their names?

[thirsty]

Not just name, but the shipping addresses were obviously postal forwarding.

[cladner]

GE price is on a definite upswing.  strong price support at the $305 level on amazon and also getting to $300 on ebay.

amazon prices have been surging in the last few weeks. 

i have sold 2 in the last week for $329+amazon fees FBM and i think the prices quoted on camel3 represent prices that units are selling for. They sold within hours of listing.  ebay hasn't caught up yet.  

GE was once upon  a time the most hoarded set in the brickfolio.

hopefully this hits $399 by the end of the year.  seems like we are getting into the phase of price appreciation where people have sell target prices and not undercutting as much.

Edited June 22, 2016 by cladner

[BrickLegacy]

I'm out of GE so I no longer have skin in this game but I don't think it has a chance to hit $400 by the end of the year.  I would expect some price suppression around the holidays like we saw in 2015 (see chart above).

[Yinchuan]

37 minutes ago, cladner said:

GE price is on a definite upswing.  strong price support at the $305 level on amazon and also getting to $300 on ebay.

amazon prices have been surging in the last few weeks. 

i have sold 2 in the last week for $329+amazon fees FBM and i think the prices quoted on camel3 represent prices that units are selling for. They sold within hours of listing.  ebay hasn't caught up yet.  

GE was once upon  a time the most hoarded set in the brickfolio.

hopefully this hits $399 by the end of the year.  seems like we are getting into the phase of price appreciation where people have sell target prices and not undercutting as much.

These are asking or actual sold prices?