Subject:
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Re: what makes a legend?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.lego.direct
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Date:
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Wed, 24 Oct 2001 05:15:56 GMT
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Viewed:
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695 times
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In lugnet.lego.direct, Larry Pieniazek writes:
> LD has a mandate. That's "direct to consumer". It is not "retail". You can
> fault the organization of the company if you like, or you can hope that if
> LD is successful, LD type thinking will catch on elsewhere. But saying "go
> sell these sets in stores" (as you have) means you are asking LD to take on
> Futura, and take on the mandate of what Retail does. That may well be a
> political battle that Brad cannot yet win (if he even would want to engage
> it!!! Which I doubt.).
<and later>
> Me, I want to help LD succeed in every way I can, as I see it as the little
> engine that will drag the rest of the semi-inert spaceship that is TLC where
> we want it to go.
That's been my reading of the subject. LD has to go to the
feeding trough as an intruding tendril of the company, rather
than as its lifeblood--in a sense, it's a shoot off of the main
vine that continues to get stronger, but still can't dictate
to the rest of the company. It's the little dynamo, fueled
by direct interaction with and recruitment from the AFOL
community.
> LD has a budget. That budget, I speculate, includes a few dollars for new
> colors of existing parts (yes, this is not free), but almost certainly does
> NOT include dollars for new colors never seen before. It almost certainly
> does not include new parts.
I can agree with the first and the last statements, but I'd
say that the presence of a new color (Dark Red) in the Rebel
Blockade Runner is a pretty clear indication that new colors
are at least possible for LD, if still uncommon. And are those
parts printed, or are they stickers? That would also require a bit
of new printing design.
(And what's with those 1x4 plates that angle outward to 2x? I
have never seen those anywhere before!)
> LD has gotten permission to design a few new sets under severe cost
> constraint, I speculate. LD has gotten permission to bring back some sets,
> again under severe cost constraint, I speculate.
We'll almost certainly never get a really clear idea of LD's
balance sheet. That said, the operation is tiny in comparison
to Futura, and the impression I've gotten from everyone I've
spoken to--including LD people--is that LD took coaxing to
launch, and continues to require coaxing and energy input from
its team to exist, expand, and fight for resources from within
the company. The day may come when a mold is reconstructed--
there's no way that they couldn't be, as each surely has
a whole series of drawings and numbers on file--but the dollar
signs and the organizational inertia don't warrant it at this time.
But time does change things--considering LUGNET just had a big
ol' 3rd birthday, think back (for us old-timers) to rtl and atl (I
was only a lurker then!), and how far things really have come.
That said, I think that wishing and dreaming and, most of all,
ASKING for these parts is absolutely crucial to helping overcome
what limits currently exist. The only thing as important one
can do is support LD as a consumer--something I don't have any
trouble with whatsoever. (That's why, whenever Richard would
run around screaming "Cypress trees! Cypress trees! My kingdom
for cypress trees!" I thought it was a *good* thing.)
Um, all of that aside, I'm busily looking through my wish lists,
and seeing what's out there that fits my "want" plus "useful"
lists. I've been delighted so far, and I have no reason to
expect that it won't continue.
best
LFB
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: what makes a legend?
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| (...) "every problem has a simple solution. Unfortunately, it's often wrong" Just thought I'd toss that out to ponder. (...) Great advice in general. Not a valid response to Geoffrey who is asking "why can't we have this part back that we don't have (...) (23 years ago, 24-Oct-01, to lugnet.lego.direct)
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