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Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

manufacturingdive.com

201–210 of 345 posts

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they just received some good old-fashioned tax incentives? It's not always about geopolitics.

My guess is that Lego customers are also increasingly older. I mean look at the millennium falcon. https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/millennium-falcon-75192 https://i.imgur.com/vsxVnSJ.png ages 16+ When I think of fancy lego, I think of something like this https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/lego-medium-creative-bric... because it has wheels and stuff, not just bricks. I would have imagined "regular" lego was just di…

[deleted]

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#202

This makes it sound like there's quite the demand for Lego sets/bricks. Has their market (people who want to play with Legos) grown a lot? I stopped playing with Legos about 2 decades ago, so I haven't really kept up with any potential growth that they've experienced/predicted to experience.

I the last 3-4 years LEGO has definitely decided to focus more on the adult market. There's a lot more 18+ big sets now than there used to be in the past.

Kind of make sense because a lot people who played with LEGO in their childhood in the 80's / 90's are now at the age where they are more likely to have disposable income and get back into the hobby.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anyone know what changed economically to justify the high US labor costs? Particularly compared to MX My understanding is the US: 1. Is more politically, economically, and frankly physically secure than Mexico. 2. Has cheaper energy 3. Has a better-trained manufacturing workforce for the kinds of machine Lego is gonna use.

Maybe they just received some good old-fashioned tax incentives? It's not always about geopolitics.

Tax incentives are geopolitics. That's why all the best sci-fi TV shows came out of Vancouver for a while and every movie and TV show for the last several years thanks the state of Georgia.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're the "largest" manufacturer of tiny little toy car wheels that use a few grams of rubber. It's a paid ad for LEGO, not a serious record.

As opposed to those serious Guiness records like "farthest eyeball pop", "loudest purr by a domestic cat", "most face flesh tunnels", "most tennis balls held in the mouth (by a dog)", "most eyebrow waxes performed in eight hours by a team", and "longest head massage chain". Guiness has always been a half-commercial silly enterprise. It's literally founded by a beer brand to resolve pub trivia arguments.

>Guiness has always been a half-commercial silly enterprise. It's literally founded by a beer brand to resolve pub trivia arguments.

Oh, those are the same Guinness! I always wondered.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As opposed to those serious Guiness records like "farthest eyeball pop", "loudest purr by a domestic cat", "most face flesh tunnels", "most tennis balls held in the mouth (by a dog)", "most eyebrow waxes performed in eight hours by a team", and "longest head massage chain". Guiness has always been a half-commercial silly enterprise. It's literally founded by a beer brand to resolve pub trivia arguments.

>Guiness has always been a half-commercial silly enterprise. It's literally founded by a beer brand to resolve pub trivia arguments. Oh, those are the same Guinness! I always wondered.

And the Michelin Guide is published by the tire company, originally as a means to encourage car travel.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe they just received some good old-fashioned tax incentives? It's not always about geopolitics.

My guess is that Lego customers are also increasingly older. I mean look at the millennium falcon. https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/millennium-falcon-75192 https://i.imgur.com/vsxVnSJ.png ages 16+ When I think of fancy lego, I think of something like this https://www.lego.com/en-us/product/lego-medium-creative-bric... because it has wheels and stuff, not just bricks. I would have imagined "regular" lego was just di…

Investors?

LEGO Group A/S remains privately held by the family that started it in Denmark.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#207

Hopefully all American employees get the same treatment as European employees, rather than hiring a bunch of US-entrenched management and having them go "well this is an American plant, so we don't have to give you a minimum number of vacation days, and we only need to wage gauge you a tiny bit less than other companies in this space int he US for you to feel like we're treating you well". It's so easy to open a plan…

It is striking how quickly the US turned into a backwater for all types of labor.

What's striking is that every time I talk about moving to Europe I have to cut my salary expectations in half. Talk about backwater expectations.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#208

The Legoland park was pretty disappointing.

It’s not great, but I do think it’s best enjoyed by a child of a certain age. I’m gonna go with 7-11 years of age. It’s not even close to Disneyland, but if your kid likes legos and they’re of that age group they’ll have a good time.

Disneyland has long waits for each attraction. Combine that with lots of sun and impatient kids and the result is an unpleasant experience.

That and the long forgotten characters of 100 years ago.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#209
post #115

They really need to work out their quality deficits first, a lot of recent mishaps have been inexcusable. You can't sell a $600 display model(which is a ridiculous price in the first place) with very visible gate locations from the molding process and uneven colors. These are purely caused by cheap molds and plastic mixes - it didn't used to be this way, but somehow they decided that they had to start jeopardizing th…

LEGO absolutely has a quality problem now. I am in my 30s and I had never seen a LEGO defect, and I have seen quite a few bricks. In the past year, I have seen several in-person among the toys I've bought for my kids, and several more anecdotally around the internet. Now I even see it here on HN. the LEGO brand had an unassailable, invincible reputation for quality, and now, for what seems like the first time, that i…

Pretty sure they switched to recycled plastics in the past few years; I would expect a few more years of issues, at least.

Re: Lego breaks ground on first US manufacturing facility

#210
post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 90s are when fancy sets with specialized pieces REALLY took off. The 90s space stuff compared with the 80s was a big shift. But that's still 30 years ago so Lego has been fancy pieces and custom kits for a couple generations of kids now.

> But that's still 30 years ago so Lego has been fancy pieces and custom kits for a couple generations of kids now. You can get a 790 piece big box of Lego brand plastic building blocks on Amazon for $35. These types of collections tend to end up in yard sells, or passed around extended families because they last longer than a single childhood. The none-fancy Lego branded blocks still exist, and are still a common pa…

Sure, and my young relatives do things basically the same as I did: have a stable of "common" bricks + a bunch of specialty models.

Then when you get bored with the specialty model as-it-is, the pieces go in the bins and you remix them with everything else :)

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