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 Dear LEGO / 2507
2506  |  2508
Subject: 
Re: Mr. Justus!
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.dear-lego
Date: 
Mon, 25 Sep 2000 20:13:21 GMT
Viewed: 
1308 times
  
Frank Filz wrote:

Eric Brok wrote:


Ok, I think you misunderstand the whole point of Shop@Home.  It's not to
get stuff cheap.  (S@H in the US has never been cheap.)  It's to get
things that you can't find in your local store.



'The thing is', that in countries like Germany and the Netherlands, every
corner's toy store does already have the full (european) line.

Well, if that really is the case, you folks in some ways have it better
than we do in the US. Very few stores even carry the full line of what
is typically sold in the stores, and there are bunches of things like
train track (which apparently TLC has decided that retail stores CAN'T
sell), Scala, and Belville that aren't sold in stores (not sure they
even can, though last year around Easter I did see a Belville set in a
K-Mart, so they can conceivably get them). We do have a small handfull
of stores that carry a more complete range (but The Construction Company
is the only store not owned by TLC that I am aware of).

Now what we all have a mostly legitimate beef about is that there are a
number of sets which aren't available in all markets.

So
Shop-at-home will only have any business here if:
- they offer non-european sets
- they offer accesory sets

I expect that they will expand to these. You need to remember that it
isn't easy to create a mail order buisiness out of thin air. Time is
needed to staff up, build inventory, etc. I wonder how S@H US started
up? Did they immediately offer the full line (which was probably much
smaller then)? How prevalent is mail order buisiness in Europe? In the
US, it has a history of success for over 100 years, and was a
significant contributor to expansion into the west (Montgomery Ward and
Sears and Roebuck are the two big names of course).

- they offer cheap an/or hard-to-find 'bulk' pieces

Well, they do offer the new bulk packs (or at least some of them) don't
they?

(- payment other than credit-card (althoug cc's catch on because of
e-commerce).)

I wouldn't hold my breath too hard for this. It would be nice if the web
site provided a way to print an order which you could mail in with a
check, but that's the only real option.

FUT: lugnet.dear-lego

--
Frank Filz

-----------------------------
Work: mailto:ffilz@us.ibm.com (business only please)
Home: mailto:ffilz@mindspring.com

Frank, I cannot speak for the rest of Europe, but I have always been surprised
at how much more Lego variety I have found in German toy sellers, as compared to
the USA.  And I have been to over 100 German Lego retailers (in 13 visits to
Germany).  They always had more available than we did, especially in spare parts
(zubehör/erzatzteile).

Gary Istok



Message has 1 Reply:
  Re: Mr. Justus!
 
"Gary Istok" <gistok@umich.edu> wrote in message news:39CFB1E1.4576AB...ich.edu... (...) surprised (...) compared to (...) to (...) parts (...) I've been told by a couple of very reliable sources that the German market is much broader than other (...) (24 years ago, 25-Sep-00, to lugnet.dear-lego)

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