"Ninjago Ultra Violet", "Percival Graves" and "Velociraptor with Sand Green Back" are just three sought-after Lego mini-figures that were among 600 or more stolen in Los Angeles last month. In a predawn spree that lasted little more than a minute, the thief stuffed a garbage bag with about $10,000 worth of figurines before sprinting to a waiting car and speeding off.
The heist was one of seven carried out at Bricks & Minifigs outlets in the LA region since April, a $100,000-plus crime spree that, on the heels of other similar incidents, has rattled the growing — but cloistered — world of Lego collectors and merchants.
The COVID-19 pandemic turbocharged the Lego collecting hobby, with homebound collectors blitzing online resellers in search of coveted items. That drove up prices, experts said, and attracted criminals. Bricks & Minifigs, a franchised chain with more than 100 locations nationwide, maintains a unique position in the Lego economy. Unlike official Lego stores, Bricks & Minifigs outposts carry valuable sets and figurines no longer in production. Some are sold in their unopened boxes. Others are displayed in glass cases.
These days, Lego encompasses a sprawling, multi-billion dollar ecosystem of toys, video games, retail stores, television shows, films, amusement parks and more. But in 2003 (unable to adapt to the digital marketplace) the Danish company was close to bankruptcy. But the company course corrected by getting back to basics — and understanding it needed "to innovate around the brick," he said. That largely came in the form of storytelling.
"They had to create worlds and characters," said Robertson, a senior lecturer at the MIT Sloan School of Management. "They had to tell those stories with things outside the box: comic books, young adult fiction, movies, apps and ties to other [companies'] intellectual property, like 'Batman' and 'Star Wars.'" To some Gen Xers' disdain, children were no longer content building their own creations out of the same bucket of bricks. They wanted new, evermore costly kits — and the hobby became far more expensive.
Lego mini-figures — which are most commonly found in the company's sets and in mystery boxes where the buyer doesn't know what's inside — have been transformed into full-fledged characters through their appearances in films, TV shows and other media. That has put them, and not the bricks, at the center of the play ecosystem. The turnaround is apparent in the company's financials: Lego Group's revenue in 2023 was $9.65 billion, up about 74% from five years earlier.
Lego is the rare toy whose appeal transcends childhood, and it maintains a strong base of devotees who are known as "AFOLs," or "adult fans of Lego." Armed with disposable income, AFOLs have turned collecting high-end sets and mini-figures into a booming online business. Robertson, for example, just bought a Lego model of Notre-Dame Cathedral that clocks in at 4,383 pieces and costs $300.
According to BrickEconomy.com, the most valuable mini-figure is a limited-edition Spider-Man version given out to attendees at Comic-Con in 2013 that's now worth $5,500. The website lists 16 other figurines valued at more than $1,000.
Just days after the Bricks & Minifigs burglaries began, the California Highway Patrol arrested four suspects after officers found them in possession of stolen Legos worth $300,000. They'd allegedly taken sets from retailers including Target and stored the goods at stash houses in L.A. and Orange counties. Then, in early June, the Los Angeles Police Department announced it'd broken up another alleged Lego theft ring, arresting two people and seizing nearly 3,000 boxes of Legos kept at a property in Long Beach.
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