How to save 40% at the Lego Store

Greetings ninjas! Christmas is coming up very soon and I thought I should talk strategy. It might seem odd to discuss Christmas in October, but there are several important deals right now, that might it vital to discuss this early.  What follows if a short guide in how to maximize your money during the Christmas season.

Double Points: 

I mentioned earlier how you can start to rack up coupons during double points months.  The Lego store offers a VIP card that gives you a 5 dollar coupon for every 100 dollars you spend.  During double points months, you get a 5 dollar coupon for every 50 dollars you spend. That might not sound like a high amount, but Legos can add up quickly. One of my favorites is the Temple of Arijitzu. It costs 200 dollars. If I bought that during the double points months that give me 20 dollars of coupons!! Double points ends this month on the 14^th!

Add ons:

On top of that, if you are going to spend that kind of money, you should shop during the special holiday promotions.  Last year I got a great Elf Workshop when I bought 99 dollars or more of products.  This year they have an adorable red train.  Again, if you have multiple kids, or even one kid that wants a mid priced set, you can easily reach 100 dollars.  If you are spending that money anyway you can time it so you also get a great Christmas themed item.  This item is only available from the 13^th of October to the 13^th of November.  So you’ll want to shop on the 13^th or 14^th of October so you get double points and the holiday train!!  

Investment Items:

Maybe you don’t have any big ticket items on your list. You can still buy advent calendars in October and resell them around Thanksgiving. (Don't tell the Lego store employees you plan on doing that. They don't like it.) Most people don’t realize until its too late that advent calendars sell out by late October so there is a good market for these. The Star Wars version is particularly popular.  Last year me and my daughter got a great Darth Vader with red trim and a red cape, as well as an R2D2 dressed like a Christmas tree. These are great for your kids, but they also make great investment items.  Last year right around Thanksgiving (right before the advent month starts) they were selling for about 10-20 dollars higher than their sticker price. (Last year's LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar 75056 is selling for almost double its original price).  So you can purchase a calendar in October, get the free holiday train set , and double vip points for the purchase, and then turn around a month later and recoup all of your money and even make a little profit.  To a lesser extant you can do this with the minifigures as well. These are highly specialized figures that come in blind bags and cost 4 dollars each. If you need to reach 100 dollars to get the promo you can buy a few of these and open them to see what they are, and then resell them. If you're ambitious might also like to keep them for a home made advent calendar.  On top of that, they are Halloween themed. So if you decide to keep them you get some cool monster themed Legos you can pull out every year.

Adding it up:

In short, you can easily get the holiday promotion and rack up coupons without spending that much money.  The Star Wars Advent Calendar is 40 dollars, your families Christmas presents are another 40 dollars, and you get 5 minifigures for 20 dollars which gets you up to 100 dollars, plus tax that would be about 107 dollars.

But if you sell back the advent calendar for a small profit (about 50 dollars would be a safe assumption) and two of the minifigures you don’t want (at cost) you’ll get around 58 dollars back. You will also get 10 dollars in coupons for purchasing during a double points period.  And you’ll get a train set worth 15 dollars. If you don’t sell the train set that means you got 67 dollars (115 for the total worth of your products, minus the 48 dollars at cost of the products you sold back) of Lego products for only spending about 39 dollars!!!! (107 dollars spent minus the 58 you sold them for and 10 dollars of coupons)  That is close to 40% off!!!!! 

Plus, you’ll be getting money into your account right around the start of December which is always nice for buying some more presents or those lousy fundraisers your kids have. I don’t know if you’re like me, but getting extra money into account feels like new money, even if you’re just getting back what you just spent.  So it’s a nice psychological boost when you need it. 

You’ll have to do a little bit of work.  Though making a trip to the store, selling on ebay, and dropping off a package aren’t terribly difficult actions.  And if you’re reading this blog you likely have the motivation to save money and see the effort as very worth it.  You can get some Christmas presents, a nice Christmas Lego you can use year after year, some Halloween Legos you can use year after year, you get some coupons for more Legos, and you can help somebody out who is panicking about an advent calendar at the start of December. And you can do all of this for 40% off at a total cost of 39 dollars and some time spent!  Ninja level achieved!  As always, make sure to follow me on facebook for the most current updates.  For example, there is a free giveaway at Toys R Us this Saturday.

32 Dollars of Legos for 10: Ninja Mission Accomplished!

Greetings ninjas! Earlier this month I managed to score quite a few Legos for only 10 dollars!! Here is what I got:

Here is how I did it and some ideas to consider as you shop. 

1. Free goodies:  

You'll see in the top left is a Storm Trooper Lego. This was a limited edition door gift on force Friday.  Toys R Us and many other places have these deals on a regular basis. Force Friday started Thursday night at midnight, but most of these are on Saturday mornings. They are small, and they might take some time, but they are a great way to spend time with your kids. After awhile the free stuff starts to add up. I've got a Lego door to Jurassic World, Sponge Bob in a top hat, a Frankenstein Halloween figure, and now an exclusive Star Wars piece for free!! 

2. Sales: 

The next item is a scene from the Lego movie.  It normally costs 13 dollars, but it was on sale for 6.45.  That is 50% off!! The drawback is that the movie was over 18 months ago. So if your child really really wanted a particular item from the movie this method wouldn't work. But if you can handle waiting, and don't mind getting whatever is unwanted and still in stock by then, it works out well. Me and my daughter loved the movie, but we didn't really need or want this set. So getting three mini figures (two of them main characters), and a nice little building was a good deal for us.  

3. Divide and Sell: 

We bought two very nice sets earlier in the year. The Double Decker Couch and the Angry Kitty set had all of the main characters and some nice small sets like Emmett's car for very good prices. As a result of this, we already had an Emmett and I decided to sell that figure on Ebay. With all of these good deals the market isn't too high for that figure, but I did sell him for 2.49.  If you subtract that from the original (sale) price, I only paid 4 dollars for this item!!! If you are buying for your kids this can be hard to do. I simply explain to my daughter that we probably don't need two of the same thing, and when we make money on ebay, that becomes even more money for buying Legos! You might also want to carefully consider the resell value of the product.  If you might want any set as an investment product, then its vital that you have the entire set. 

4. Reward Points: 

At the bottom you see 4 mystery bags. These are specialized minifigures that are released in groups of 16. They are fun little purchases, especially if you are good at feeling items within the bag to know what you are getting.  The current series is monster themed and we managed to find 4 that we liked. These are normally 3.99 each. But I decided to cash our my reward points at the Lego store and I payed only 6 dollars! 

You get one reward point for every purchase and after 100 dollars you get a 5 dollar coupon.  That sounds like many purchases to get there, but keep in mind that's essentially 5% off every purchase. Sometimes the Lego store has double point months, where it only takes 50 dollars to get there. (Those months usually have special exclusive products that are free when you get over 100 dollars. I'll talk about how to maximize those deals in a future Christmas strategy post.)  In double point periods it means every purchase is 10% off.  On top of that, the Lego club offers special coupons.  With any purchases in that month it automatically rewards you 100 points or 5 dollars of your next purchase.  That might sound like a gimmick to buy more products.  But when you are buying products that range from 1 dollar to 2.50, you can rack up those points rather quickly.

When all is said and done I bought 25 dollars worth of Lego products, and got an exclusive brick currently selling for 7 dollars on Ebay for 10 dollars!!! So don't blow all your money on full price Legos and end up like Chewie here.  Good luck ninjas!  I don't always create a post on this blog for every deal. So as always, please follow me on facebook to stay update on the most current deals!

Nanoblock Hot Rod

Greetings! I found a great deal on a Nanoblock Hot Rod.  Nanoblock is a Lego like company that offers slightly smaller pieces and hence more definition and detail.  Amazon normally prices them at 26 dollars, but right now they are on sale for 20.  On Ebay you can bid for the next five days starting at just 9.99!!! That's about 60% off the listed price!! If you don't have the time to bid, or if the bid reaches 19.99 you have the buy it now option, which is still the on sale price offered by Amazon.

 This is great for those that like cars, but don't like the high prices of most Nanoblock products.  The detailed engine, black color, and flames make it a nice present for adults that would normally balk at Legos.  Good luck Ninjas!!