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Just saw some interesting news…
So, with all the research I’ve been doing; Unless TRU is 30% off or more, it’s really not worth it. Shopping in any store so far isn’t worth it simply because the online sites for these stores are SO much cheaper. But these stores all have In store pick up.
The main reason why i’m against shopping at TRU, is that so far Target.com and Walmart.com are so much cheaper that their regular online prices are better than TRU sales prices (minus the deals I posted earlier, i wont post a deal unless it’s worth it.) SO, I did some checking. It turns out the TRU has a price match guarantee that INCLUDES .com sites.If it works out, (I can’t wait to try it.) if you have a smart phone, you can go through and price check apples to apples on sets at TRU and then get it for the cheaper Walmart.com/ Target.com price. This opens up another outlet in case the walmart near you is out of stock or you dont feel like waiting for the 24 hours to go pick up the item at your local Walmart. This also counts for Target and several other stores, here is the link. http://www.toysrus.com/shop/index.jsp?categoryId=11949070
Joel,
I’m pretty big on watching eBay to monitor the prices (and what’s available) for my favorite old themes. Do you check Craigslist? Blacktron I, M-Tron, and anything monorail are down my alley as well as Imperial Soldiers (the bluecoat ones) and Black Falcons.
Second Dan’s comments, except add Unitron (and Ice Planet – Evan’s also a fan), and I haven’t started hardcore collecting anything from Classic Castle or Pirates. Not saying I don’t love them / wouldn’t collect, but you can only buy so many things…
There are pretty diverse interests within our group. Every theme has some redeeming qualities. I don’t care for the Chima theme / minifigs as they are, but they do have some good parts / colors. Same goes for Friends (& Disney Princesses), in my mind. The color palette offered there is impossible to find elsewhere. And I’m sure there’s a market for LEGO Ariel, Cinderella, etc., although I can’t say I’ve researched it yet. TMNT, while I loved it as a child, doesn’t do it for me in LEGO for some reason. But even that has some potential if you’re looking for parts. Basically any licensed sets have potential to resell the minifigs (well, not Lone Ranger… nobody wants that stuff). If you do buy sets for parts and don’t want the figs, we could always talk about listing them in my store – Bricks On The Dollar does that for several of the PennLUG guys.
BOGO 40% off, stacks on sets already on clearance. If you’ve been wanting to stock up on certain sets (LOTR / Star Wars / Castle, mostly) and / or NERF products, now’s your chance. Full list of eligible stuff:
Managed to pick this up from ToysRUs for $28.88
That price looks more accurate than the $65.
It’s 423 pieces, Lego likes to mark it up when there’s stuff like train track involved. $28.88 is still a sweet deal though.
Is anyone interested in this craigslist posting for Star Wars sets in Bethel Park?
http://pittsburgh.craigslist.org/tag/4542348600.html
I know someone in Bethel Park. 🙂 🙂 🙂
certainly some nice sets there. When I emailed him last week, he didnt have the full list of sets, but I see he attached the list that he sent to me.
I’m always up for $0.05 a piece deals, but not looking to jump into anything starwars. I’ll gladly do leg work for anyone that wants it though.
The TARGET near me now has the (probably not so) limited edition of the LEGO Movie on the shelves for $39.99. Also the Simpson’s are now marked down to $2.99 each, I verified this with the scanner.
But for tonight’s BIG story … I suppose it is not illegal to get someone’s hopes up using craigslist, but this was going to be my purchase of the year! I accidentally stumbled onto craigslist for the part of country where we are going in two weeks. I contacted the lady Sunday and asked her if she could hold it if I sent payment. She said to send a check and she gave me the address. I had a cashier’s check made out to her at the bank on Monday and contacted her to tell her I was mailing it and then she said it was sold to someone else. WHAT?? (ugh)
If you are near a TARGET, this is one time of year that they clear out old LEGO inventory with discounts. I have seen 30% and 50% off sales so far.
Wow, how does someone get this many pieces of these types unless they find them on a PaB wall? Carayzee!
For a mere $250, one could have enough Pearl Gold Minifig, Utensil Coin Type 2 with 10 Marks to fill the Lestrange Vault!
The ingots would also be nice, but that’s heftier investment of $1222. Can’t justify that kind of expenditure just because a thing is gold and shiny.
CAUTION: Either this is the most amazing internet store for buying new LEGO sets or it is a total scam. The prices are 30% less than anywhere else. I only found it because it was a sponsored link at the bottom of an eBay page.
It seems that it only opened in July. I was afraid to order anything. I read one review on a site called Ripoff Reports and although the person did not actually purchase anything, they reported that it was difficult to verify that there was anything real about the store.
I think retail stores who have a contract to sell LEGO products agree to sell at certain minimum prices until a certain date. I could be making this up, but I have read that there are a lot of rules for opening an independent store which sells LEGO. I’ve only seen one: http://www.thecornertoystore.com/ I’ve actually walked into this store, and its been around for years, so I know its real.
The fact that the website banner uses the word “Lego” in it makes me suspicious of its bona fides as well.
I can’t find anything to verify the validity of the store and I’m not even sure where it’s located but I can’t find anything wrong with it either. I thought maybe their trick was to lure you in with low prices and then hit you with unreasonable shipping costs, but i added a set to the cart and put in my zipcode and shipping was free.
So it could be a scam, but I have an alternate theory. A quick look around indicates that most of the sets are not current, but go back a year or two, and are hardly a complete representation of what’s available. I’m thinking they almost certainly aren’t dealing with Lego directly, but rather getting their inventory from toy store vendors who have overstock that they just wanna move. By selling them to Lugess cheap, they cut their losses and place the burden of risk on Lugess.
I could try ordering something, it lists PayPal as an option, just a month ago I had a BrickLink seller go MIA and PayPal recovered the full amount for me (about $50) when I filed a complaint.
PS – These prices are really amazing though, I can’t help but think ‘if it seems too good to be true, then it probably is.’
I don’t know how likely this is, but another possibility is that the inventory is stolen. It’s like the cigarettes in ‘Goodfellas’ (which is how they did it in real life), people are lining up for them because it’s such a great deal for them, but for the sellers, it’s pure profit because they just took them straight off the truck.
I’ve seen ‘discount software’ websites before, I never ordered from them, but my experience was that had a short lifespan cause eventually people would be on to them, so they’d have to move to another location. So if Lugess disappears in a month or two, then we’ll know something was up.
We now have a LUG member in Australia! Zach Bauer wrote, “Tell everyone I said hi and if anyone wants some bizarre set that may exist only in Australia to just let me know and I’ll pick it up for them. I’m pretty happy about the value of Lego they have down under. I ran into a Target in Sydney yesterday to grab some stuff and 3 whole aisles of sets caught my eye 🙂 Zach”
My understanding has been that Oz is always more expensive for LEGO products, but who knows … maybe they have a store full of Falling Water sets that no one wants. 🙂
So, it’s possible that I took a $27 gamble and ordered from Lugess last week. I ordered 60045 Police Patrol. I paid through PayPal like I would anywhere else. The receipt says the money was paid to one Katrinia Robinson.
When we got to my house post-Josh’s on Saturday, I was surprised to see that I had an Amazon package at my front door, since I wasn’t expected anything from them. When I opened it, it was the set I’d ordered from Lugess.
So I got my set and didn’t get ripped off, but we’re hardly of the opinion that they are legit. The box was sealed – like a new box, not like somebody reused a box they’d received something in – with Amazon Prime Fire Phone tape, and the mailing label is printed to look *exactly* like an Amazon mailing label, complete with return address to the Amazon Fulfillment Center in Lexington, KY. But when I looked online, I found nothing to connect Lugess to Amazon; if they’re a third-party Marketplace seller there or whatever, I’m not able to find them. There was also nothing else in the box, no printed invoice or receipt or whatever.
There’s a tracking number on the box, so we entered it on UPS. The package did in fact go through Lexington and take a normal path here, but before that it was in Nashville, and before that it was in… The United States. Really, that’s all it said. So we’re thinking that the whole Amazon ruse is part of a larger plan to basically hide who and where they are. And again, the only reason we can think of them to do that, if they’re not a scam, is because the items are stolen.
I already built and then sorted the set, so I’m keeping it, but unless I can get some kind of confirmation that they’re legit, I don’t plan to order from them again. Susie thinks I should report them to Amazon, so I have to figure out where I’d go on their webpage to do that.
Ben, a plausible explanation is that the person at Lugess is ordering the sets from Amazon using a stolen credit card. The consequence of your having received the package may be that Amazon would ban you. I have heard of this happening to someone who received items from LEGO Shop at Home that they ordered from a third party.
It seems to me that the only way for Lugess to be legit would be for them to have some kind of discount deal for merchants with Amazon. But I don’t see why Amazon would help other people undercut their own prices.
Sounds like a “drop shipping” scam, though I find it strange that they went to the extent of building their own website for this instead of using eBay. They probably pocketed your money and ordered the set via Amazon using a stolen credit card for payment. I would agree with reporting them to Amazon, and maybe even Lego as well. Odd that no packing slip is included.
One other possibility that I just thought of is that the PayPal link that you clicked on checkout from Lugess had the typical functionality of a PayPal link but also enabled the seller to get your PayPal login and password. I would check my account and change the password.
Odd that no packing slip is included.
I think you can designate an Amazon package as a gift so that there is no invoice / packing slip.
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