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This is a listing of a number of things that happened at Mindfest both related
to the NELUG table and in general.
1. There were quite a few TLG reps on hand and many of us had a chance to chat
with them. I will relate the few experiances I had and would encourage anyone
else how had conversations with TLG reps to post follow-ups here.
I think that many of us in our discusions at one time or another would at least
mention bulk ordering and sometimes it would end with that and other times we
would get a response. I did not really press the issue as I did not want to
burn to many bridges but I did mention it. I did learn a couple of things
A. TLG knows there is an Adult Fan Base that wants bulk ordering.
B. At least some reps are familiar with LUGNET and with at least occasionally
read it.
C. From what I was told, and I don't know much about where and how bricks are
made, TLG does have the capability to do bulk orders but their biggest hurdle
is to cut down shipping costs to make it worth while. It seemed to me that
they were saying that the parts are all manufactured in Europe and the problem
resides in filling bulk orders and keeping shipping costs down. Know I have
no idea how much of this is true but this is what I understood from my
conversations.
In other conversations with TLG reps they were asking us about what we would
like to see as the next Mindstorms Star Wars set. It seemed like they are
having problems comming up with something besides the current Droid Developer
Kit. To tell you the truth we had problems coming up with something that was
both reasonable and feasable for a Mindstorms Kit. One idea we did discuss was
the Droid Fighter and have it be able to transform and walk around. We were
then asked how much we would be willing to pay for such a set and my answer was
that if it came with the standard RCX I would be willing to pay as much as what
they sell the current Mindstorms kit for ($200) if not a little more. I also
added that if it came with something like the Scout I probably would not even
bother.
We also had a short conversation about how to create a group where kids could
get together and do Mindstorms. This is a problem for TLG because they have
addresses for all the kids that have Mindstorms but obviously cannot share that
information. I did not really have any good ideas either because any time you
are talking about kids it can be a very sensitive thing.
2. Aside from talks with TLG reps we have been asked to set up our Star Wars
display in the window of a local toy store called The Construction Site (
http://www.constructiontoys.com/ ). If everything goes as planned the setup
will go up around the first of November and come down around Thanksgiving.
3. I was asked by Mother about getting kids together and although I told her
our group was for Adults that I would talk with her and see if I could help get
her started (again when you are talking kids there are alot of liability issues
that have to be considered). It seems that although most kids have LEGO and
have friends with LEGO, there are still relatively few that do Mindstorms and
that there is a need for a forum where kids can get together and discuss
Mindstorms.
4. I was seems that all of the great people I have met through LUGNET really
are just as nice and friendly and I thought they were. I think that it is a
credit to the people that participate in the discussions here that events like
this can happen.
Thanks again to everyone involved. I may post some more personal experiances
when I have time.
Eric Kingsley
Remove ".nospam" when replying by E-mail.
The New England LEGO Users Group
http://www.nelug.org/
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: More Mindfest Tidbits
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| (...) I'll pay shipping costs, no problem. I will also quite happily wait for overseas shipping. I think very few AFOLs will have any problem with a 'pay and wait' policy, because we're generally quite used to that in the second hand market. James (...) (25 years ago, 26-Oct-99, to lugnet.org.us, lugnet.general, lugnet.loc.us.ma.bos)
| | | Re: More Mindfest Tidbits
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| (...) are (...) hurdle (...) that (...) problem (...) have (...) Perhaps we are approaching the problem wrong when we try to to get them to notice us by using a dollar ammount or a piece count as an attractive minimum order (as has been discussed (...) (25 years ago, 27-Oct-99, to lugnet.org.us, lugnet.general, lugnet.loc.us.ma.bos)
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