Fast Company:
In the last 10 years, Lego has grown into nothing less than the Apple of toys: a profit-generating, design-driven miracle built around premium, intuitive, highly covetable hardware that fans can’t get enough of. Last year, fueled in part by The Lego Movie’s Pixar-size popularity, the privately held company briefly surged ahead of rival Mattel to become the biggest toy manufacturer in the world, reporting first-half profits of $273 million on revenue of $2.03 billion.
An interesting read. Three things I see that changed the arc of Lego’s fortunes: First, there was the Star Wars marketing deal that allowed Lego to create an incredibly popular series of Star Wars-themed kits.
Second, there was the move into video games with Lego Star Wars, Lego Harry Potter, Lego Batman, etc. These games also saw the emergence of Lego’s sense of humor.
Finally, all of these marketing deals came together (along with that tongue in cheek sense of humor) to create the “Everything is Awesome” Lego Movie.
Fans adore the brand. Just like Apple.
Yeah, no kidding fans adore the brand. I work across the street from Legoland, and when they have an event, getting out of the parking lot and getting home can be a massive PIA. And when there were massive fires last May, the traffic leaving the area was so bad I just stayed at work and hoped the fire didn’t come too close.
Can I just take a second here to say how great the Lego Movie was? As a life-long Lego fan I was worried when it was first announced. I thought, “Oh no, they’re going to make some goofy movie that is tangentially related to Lego. Then they’ll make a bunch of crappy Lego sets to sell.”
The actual movie couldn’t be further from the truth. Not only is it a great story that tells the story of Lego (you can follow the directions or make your own creations, the only thing you shouldn’t do is put lego on a shelf) but it’s funny, includes lots of Lego references (to sets, styles of building, etc.), and is amazingly well animated.
Additionally, they did make a bunch of Lego sets. And they’re, to over use a word, Awesome.
If Lego is privately held, why would they be releasing profit statements?
I talked with one of the local Lego Store guys who has been at our store for years. He said Lego had a make or break kind of crisis in the mid 00s. They were making tons of one-off bricks for sets that didn’t have a whole lot of appeal except to their current customer base. Lego decided the way out of the crisis was to increase their customer base. They scaled the one-offs way back and brought in the third-party branding like Star Wars, Batman and Harry Potter. They also introduced the Lego Friends line for girls. According to the guy I talked with, Friends is their biggest line right now.
Agreed. My wife and I watched it at my sister’s house when we visited for Xmas (she has a 13-year-old and a 10-year-old). We loved the movie and have been singing “Everything is Awesome” ever since.
Lego has also targeted the high end and done it’s best to keep die hard fans happy.
The number of expensive sets (eg UCS), or those with high number of pieces (eg Tower of Orthanc, Simpsons House, Sydney Opera House) and those complex builds (eg Technic) have won over these people. A quick survey of YouTube reveals the number of adults (not kids) reviewing these sets. They seem to be happy spending hundreds of dollars so long as Lego keeps supplying them with quality sets.
So whilst Lego Friends may be their best sellers, Lego has not forgotten the high end.