No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find Items

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No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find Items

Post by Toys N Bricks » Fri Oct 18, 2013 6:24 am

There's been quite a few reports and rumors circulating regarding no sales or discounts on LEGO exclusives and hard to find items. Recently, John paid a visit to his local LEGO Brand Store with a 10% off store coupon only to be disappointed that LEGO Exclusives and Hard to Find Items like Modular Buildings, Death Star, Winter Village sets, etc are excluded from all sales. This isn't just for LEGO Brand Stores and LEGO Shop at Home. In fact, its for all other retailers that carry these sets such as Amazon, Toys R Us, Wal-Mart and Target.

He emailed LEGO and this is their reply:

The LEGO Group is dedicated to providing a consistent price and experience with our most exclusive items. Bottom line, xxx, is that we are not able to accept discounts on any 'hard to find' or 'exclusive' items. Since this is a fairly new policy, we appreciate receiving your feedback that it needs to be more clearly communicated on the coupon itself. What this also means is you will not find these items on sale at special pricing on Amazon.com or other retailers either so the price on www.ShopLEGO.com and in our Brand Stores is the best price you will find.

What do you think of this policy? Before, LEGO exclusives are usually available to retailers other than just LEGO itself after a few months of release. Normally, discounts can be obtained on these sets from these other retailers.

With this new policy, is there really a need for these other retailers to carry these sets considering they won't be discounted anymore? After all, you do get VIP points and occasionally special free gifts from LEGO Stores and Shop at Home, which of course provides a better incentive for buying from them.

Article Link: http://toysnbricks.com/no-discounts-pol ... ind-items/
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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by hatcher » Fri Oct 18, 2013 10:39 am

I think its a really smart move on LEGO's part. If no one else is allowed to offer discounts on these items, why would anyone buy from them? More sales for LEGO stores and online.

However, as a consumer, I REALLY hate this policy for obvious reasons.
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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by gorenoirmag » Fri Oct 18, 2013 10:41 am

As a person who likes discounts that sucks but it's a smart move in that people won't be tempted to wait the set out until it hits another retailer. Also not everyone can purchase from Lego direct or has a Lego store close to them and might buy one of these sets on impulse at another retailer.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by Tyrant01 » Fri Oct 18, 2013 10:42 am

Even though I never got one of those 10% off coupons on any of my catalogs and I think I only got two of these types of sets (MMV and the Joust set) on any kind of real discount, I think the policy is not a good idea. I don't really understand what the point of it is beyond maximizing profits (which is okay, but don't dance around the issue).

As for why order any place else, depending on what state you live in you can still order from Amazon and not get charged tax. I think between the freebies and the 10% ordering from LEGO is usually going to be the better deal, but I could see someone preferring to go with Amazon for the tax reason.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by littlemic » Fri Oct 18, 2013 10:58 am

I hate this policy. I couldn't afford to buy the exclusives without discount. not to mention Lego is raising prices on new exclusive products too. all they care is how to maximize their profit.

can we collect votes and submit to Lego, requesting them to remove this new policy? hope if we have enough votes, they will hear our voice.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by nick91884 » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:04 am

Sounds an awful lot like price fixing to me
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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by that guy » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:07 am

I was told this policy was in direct response to Amazon, Walmart, and other who felt they were being undercut by Lego directly especially when Lego has now cut off some of the big box retailers from the exclusives all together. I forget if the article above mentions it but this policy applies to employees of Lego as well. My local store told me they can't use their discounts for HTF/Exclusive sets anymore either. This was supposedly one of the conditions of Amazon and others but who know for real.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by GoldenBricks » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:11 am

The Lego Group is in general changing many of their policies in an atempt to increase their bottom line which I have no problem with in general but they have now reached a point where they are using their market share to bully retailers and others to the point of being greedy beyond what many other companies would pursue because of not wanting to tarnish their image of being a "customer friendly" company.

Example: The Lego Group's recent adopting of the policy of instructing store employees to ban customers that appear to be buying Lego for the purpose of resale. Employees are told, using their discretion, to inform such ones that they will no longer be allowed to purchase anymore Lego products from their stores or their "Shop At Home" website. After that they are to give these miscreants (for assuming that they have the right to resale Lego products with out Lego's express approval and permission) a paper that states...

"ln an effort to clarify existing LEGO policies, I am
sharing this message with you. The LEGO Store sells
and ships products to end-user consumers only. You
may not purchase LEGO products for resale via the
shop.Lego.com site or LEGO Brand Retail Stores. We
reserve the right to cancel or suspend your online order
for further investigation, or refuse to sell to you in store
if we suspect it is being used for resale. lf you represent
a retail business and are interested in purchasing LEGO
products for resale, please contact our lndependent
Toy Dealers department to discuss our reseller
requirements by calling1-800-673-0360, or email
[email protected]."
Last edited by GoldenBricks on Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:13 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by exciter1 » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:13 am

Smart shoppers still have several ways to get great discounts on these sets.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by King » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:26 am

Toys N Bricks wrote:
With this new policy, is there really a need for these other retailers to carry these sets considering they won't be discounted anymore? After all, you do get VIP points and occasionally special free gifts from LEGO Stores and Shop at Home, which of course provides a better incentive for buying from them.
Of course there is. TLG has now said in many cases that they will sell a maximum of 3-5 of these to each customer ever. Once you have bought your 3 or so, you are done forever. We've bought hundreds of these for parts over the years from Lego, and we will never buy another from them. Our money sadly goes to Wal Mart in most cases now.

Keep in mind...we have excellent relationships with several Lego Brand Stores across a couple of states due to our heavy buying and even some of those employees have been forced to cut us off. We have never sold a complete, sealed set on Ebay, Bricklink or anywhere else. The solution that I provided to Lego was to take a black permanent marker and write "SOLD" in huge letters on the front and back of each set we bought if they were so concerned about resellers.

They politely declined.

As I said above...we now take our roughly $1500-$2000 a week we previously spent at Lego on exclusives elsewhere.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by solo606 » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:28 am

Rumor has it that this is only in effect for North America and sets are available for discount on AFOl shopping days etc in European countries. Can anyone from Europe confirm?

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by King » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:34 am

littlemic wrote:I hate this policy. I couldn't afford to buy the exclusives without discount. not to mention Lego is raising prices on new exclusive products too. all they care is how to maximize their profit.

can we collect votes and submit to Lego, requesting them to remove this new policy? hope if we have enough votes, they will hear our voice.
Sad part is that this is only going to make the post-retirement prices higher since all the speculators are not out there hoarding the sets in quantity. You better buy these when they are available or be prepared to pay through the nose.

Can't see how that is a positive for Lego fans.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by mshiels » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:44 am

nick91884 wrote:Sounds an awful lot like price fixing to me
Well actually in USA it is very legal based on past court cases, for a manufacturer to require minimum prices. That is not considered price fixing.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by Tyrant01 » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:49 am

mshiels wrote:
nick91884 wrote:Sounds an awful lot like price fixing to me
Well actually in USA it is very legal based on past court cases, for a manufacturer to require minimum prices. That is not considered price fixing.
Look at video game systems for a real good example.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by popnfresh » Fri Oct 18, 2013 11:51 am

Sounds like Lego is taking a page from the ToysRUs book of how to run a business.

Are they going to force amazon to track sales too, and report if someone dares buy two of the same thing! Or cut amazon off if they sell an item for 99.98 instead if 99.99.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by King » Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:02 pm

popnfresh wrote:Sounds like Lego is taking a page from the ToysRUs book of how to run a business.

Are they going to force amazon to track sales too, and report if someone dares buy two of the same thing! Or cut amazon off if they sell an item for 99.98 instead if 99.99.
I was told there was a system of warnings and restrictions set up if retailers break the policy. If they get enough warnings, TLG has claimed they will pull the products. (That threat seemed to work real well against TRU for breaking street dates!)

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by ausone » Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:11 pm

This is just purely GREED. 2nd largest toy manufacturer in the world that makes BILLIONS in profits need to cut 10% off coupons?? oh PLEASE. It's not that retailers like Walmart aren't selling Legos with their sales. Sounds like just a bunch of already rich folks wanting to milk more from people like us. Welcome to the corporate world.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by dulait » Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:31 pm

ausone wrote:This is just purely GREED. 2nd largest toy manufacturer in the world that makes BILLIONS in profits need to cut 10% off coupons?? oh PLEASE. It's not that retailers like Walmart aren't selling Legos with their sales. Sounds like just a bunch of already rich folks wanting to milk more from people like us. Welcome to the corporate world.
Pretty much every retail stores are greedy, yet if you are running a store, would you not want to maximize your profit by cutting corners? Also the coupons cannot be apply to Exclusives and Hard to Find Items only, regular sets are ok but most people buy elsewhere anyway. What Lego is trying to do is force people to buy these sets from them, yet they are not giving more incentive on doing so by excluding their own coupons on these sets. That being said, they did not mention anything on direct sales and price cut from their statment. Who knows, maybe they will have their own sales and discounts on these from now on. Now that is what Lego is known for, customer friendly. About limiting how many each person can buy, I totally agree with what they are trying to do.
Last edited by dulait on Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by peanut » Fri Oct 18, 2013 12:31 pm

That 10% off coupon is a joke. Price fixing at all retailers is a little harsh even if it 'makes sense on paper.' Reminds me of something Sony or Apple would do and I tend to look at them in a very different light than TLG. Perhaps not as much from now on...

edit:

"The LEGO Group is dedicated to providing a consistent price and experience with our most exclusive items."

gee, thanks!

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Re: No Discounts Policy on LEGO Exclusives & Hard to Find It

Post by 1brickshyofcrazy » Fri Oct 18, 2013 1:15 pm

I find it utterly funny that TLG would block their own "good at only LEGO Brand Store" single item 10% coupon. I mean if it's only good for a single item why not allow LEGO Exclusives and Hard to Find Items as purchase with the 10% store coupon. I can only see this as a problem if the LBS is allowing more then just a single item or ringing up the whole purchase for 10% then its really TLG that needs to revisit their store employee training.

Also, if you think about it - all the LEGO Exclusives and Hard to Find Items are not really that hard to Find or Exclusive since they are offered at several different large retailers, ie Walmart.com, Toy R US.com, Amazon.com and Target.com and of course Lego [email protected]
Yes the argument can be made that the LEGO Exclusives and Hard to Find Items are such in that yes for most if not all BM retailer stores these are very Hard to Find Items - I'm guessing it because of cost or size that most retailers don't stock these locally in their BM.

I think TLG should do what they can or want to curb the reseller issue or Fraud or what ever reason the TLG has but IMO it's really nothing to do with the items they claim are LEGO Exclusives and Hard to Find Items

Well these are my 2 pennies on a subject that could be very well already be beaten to a pulp :mrgreen:

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