Subject:
|
Re: TLC's WW Matter (was Re: Death of lugnet.western?)
|
Newsgroups:
|
lugnet.western
|
Date:
|
Sun, 18 May 2003 16:10:48 GMT
|
Viewed:
|
5691 times
|
| |
|
|
In lugnet.western, Benjamin Ellermann writes:
> I would also like more "ordinary life" sets. But you have to look at the
> history of the company. They know what works.
Huh? The Town uber-theme has been one of the longest running themes in
LEGO history, and most of it is oriented around "ordinary life". Well, if
you count emergency services as being "ordinary". Town outlasted even the
traditional Space and Castle uber-themes.
> I do not think that LEGO is overdoing it. But, I do think that LEGO could
> benefit from diversifying and add different types of sets that dont follow
> "the formula". There is a large market, especially girls, not being reached
> by LEGO. They would appreciate diverse town sets (realistic "sims" types of
> sets would be very successful - not the oversized pink fairy crud) and other
> ordinary life sets within more action oriented themes (ie The Guarded Inn).
TLC has offered up many solutions for tapping the girl market, but none
of them have found any real interest. Paradisa, Belville, Scala, and now
Clikits have all been marketed primarily towards girls.
> A large question is what will fly off of shelves. TLC knows that certain
> types of sets will be profitable and so they focus on these. There is a
> reason you find mickey mouse sets on clearance and not millenium falcons.
You've got the right idea, but you're looking in the wrong place. TLC
knows that if retailers won't order something, it doesn't really make sense
for them to make it. There may be lots of people out there who think it's
cool and would be thrilled to buy it, but if they can't get it to market,
there's no point in wasting money developing it. Right now _anything_ that
gets put on retail shelves needs to be able to respectfully hold its own
against Bionicle, Star Wars, and Harry Potter. They don't need to sell
quite that well, but they need to do better than stuff like the Time
Twisters series, or retailers will question why they should give up space
for the Big Three to devote to less profitable themes. If you want to see a
good example of retailer paranoia, look at Target. If they get an exclusive
Star Wars item and it doesn't sell out instantly, it'll start going through
a series of drastic markdowns in a matter of weeks, getting to the point
where they sell it off for as little as 1/4 the original MSRP (and probably
_half_ of what they actually paid for it). Retailers know that having
product sit untouched on shelves loses them money if that shelf space could
be devoted to product that has to be constantly replenished.
I know a lot of people have wondered why LEGO Direct seems to produce a
lot of sets that they feel are better than what makes it to retail, but it's
not a matter of LD being more devoted to making quality sets. It's a matter
of LD picking up sets when it has been decided that they probably won't sell
well at retail. Two good examples of this are the Rebel Blockade Runner (it
was decided that a $200 price tag would be too expensive for the mass retail
market) and the Bionicle Masterbuilder (it was decided that kids probably
wouldn't want a small collection of mundane animals when given the option of
buying Toa, Turaga, and Rahi instead). In both cases, LD decided that the
sets would probably sell well through direct sales, so they gave them a
second chance. Considering the fact that the RBR was introduced to retail
(unfortunately through paranoid Target) about a year after showing up
through S@H, and the Bionicle Masterbuilder hit TRU shelves a little over
half a year after being offered through S@H, both because they sold well
enough through S@H to justify trying them out through limited retail
markets, it seems that LD made good calls on both of them. I'm sure that
given the disparity in success between the S@H RBR sales and how fast Target
put it on clearance, the ISD was probably designed with the specific intent
of selling it as a S@H exclusive.
|
|
Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: TLC's WW Matter (was Re: Death of lugnet.western?)
|
| Hello all, I would like to say that this TLC's WW Matter topic should be moved to another board if you are not talking about Wild West and etc. Don't get me wrong, I got nothing against you talking about this but please move to another topic and (...) (22 years ago, 18-May-03, to lugnet.western)
|
Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: TLC's WW Matter (was Re: Death of lugnet.western?)
|
| (...) I would also like more "ordinary life" sets. But you have to look at the history of the company. They know what works. What I find amazing about TLC is how little things have changed in the last 25 years. For example new "NASA" sets are coming (...) (22 years ago, 16-May-03, to lugnet.western)
|
18 Messages in This Thread:
 
 
- Entire Thread on One Page:
- Nested:
All | Brief | Compact | Dots
Linear:
All | Brief | Compact
This Message and its Replies on One Page:
- Nested:
All | Brief | Compact | Dots
Linear:
All | Brief | Compact
|
|
|
|
