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Subject: 
Re: Nicely now. What do you think of the new colors?
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.lego, lugnet.general
Date: 
Thu, 15 Jan 2004 16:06:43 GMT
Reply-To: 
cjmasi@*nogarbageplease!Spamless!*rcn.com
Viewed: 
69 times
  
Jake McKee wrote:

It's only a couple of weeks in the new year, and it looks like it's going to be
an interesting 2004!

I have a request, but before I go any further, let me say that personally, I
understand the concerns surrounding the color changes. I know many of you think
of me as a marketer here to shill products. I'm an AFOL too with a healthy
collection of light and dark gray, so I can understand your concerns.

As both my duty as the Community Development Manager, and as an AFOL, I'm
interested in helping to make sure that the LEGO Company fully understands the
issues you have as well. I'm looking for your help to deliver the message. To be
totally clear, this is me asking in order to have answers ready if and when my
colleagues ask.

I would ask that you reply to this thread with your thoughts and feelings about
the color issue, both for and against. One post per person, I would think would
make sense. I would ask that the debate be restricted to other threads, and that
all posts be rational, calm, and non-hateful. This will ensure that I can more
easily pass along the information, and that the message isn't bogged down in
debate.

Please understand that this is simply a fact/feeling/thought finding mission,
and does not mean that the decision to change colors is going to be changed.
Many of you have asked for the latest status information. There is nothing new
to report at this point. The color change is proceeding as planned, and sets are
rolling (and have already rolled) off the line with the new colors.

But I know that you don't like this answer, so please use this opportunity (as
well as continuing to direct complaints and feedback through LEGO Customer
Service) as a way to have your voices heard.

Again, we are not changing the colors back, and from what I know now, we aren’t
considering it. This is an information gathering mission only.

Thanks in advance for your help!

Jake

---¬
Jake McKee¬
Community Development Manager¬
LEGO Community Development
¬

Jake, thanks for giving us the opportunity to be heard.

Honestly, at first I didn't care about the color change because I didn't
think it would be a big deal, but now I am concerned. I don't buy LEGO
at the same pace as some of the people around here, and that is why I am
concerned.

Last year, I was given a Super Chief engine (along with a lot of other
LEGO) as a gift. This year I was given a Mail/Baggage car as a gift, and
of course the colors match. I modified the two sets using some of my
other LEGO, and, with the exception of some seveteen-year-old slightly
yellowed gray bricks hidden in the intereior of the model, those bricks
match too. Since my LEGO store is out of Super Chief coaches I am
waiting for more coaches to arive. But my excitement about buying and
modifying those models is tempered by the concern that they won't match,
and I'll wind up with a sloppy looking train.

From a broader perspective, I worry that consumers who are not "in the
know" will simply think that the quality of LEGO bricks has declined
because, after all, the grays and browns in this set don't match the
grays and browns in the sets we already have. I wonder which is worse,
damaging the brand by allowing people to think that quality is slipping
because the colors don't match or advertizing on the box that proclaims
that the box contains "new and improved, brighter, more vibrant gray
bricks!"

Sometimes it is hard being an AFOL. Many of us feel the need to jump to
the defense of LEGO. When we hear, "LEGO is so much more exspensive than
it used to be." We often point out that it isn't, LEGO has never been a
_cheap_ (in the bad sense) toy, there are probably more inexspensive
ways to get LEGO now than there were in the old days, and, in the end,
you get what you pay for. When we hear whining about the loss of the
basic LEGO building brick, we jump in and point out that every large toy
store sells buckets of bricks and the consumer can actually buy a lot of
different bricks directly from LEGO. Our pride in our obsession to LEGO
stems from LEGO's quality. Any decrease in quality or preceived decrease
in quality makes it that much harder to stand in the toy isle and assure
a curious parent that for kid who loke to build, LEGO is worth every penny.

Chris



Message is in Reply To:
  Nicely now. What do you think of the new colors?
 
It's only a couple of weeks in the new year, and it looks like it's going to be an interesting 2004! I have a request, but before I go any further, let me say that personally, I understand the concerns surrounding the color changes. I know many of (...) (21 years ago, 15-Jan-04, to lugnet.lego, lugnet.general, FTX) !! 

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