Stickers vs Prints in LEGO Sets: What's Up With That...? [Part 2]

Color-matching, what's up with that?

Are the graphic designers drunk when they do their finals, or are the print technicians drunk when they do their set ups?

Someone, somewhere has a problem.

I really enjoy these articles, thank you for sharing them!

Agreed that colour matching would be great to hear about. As well as the choice of backing colour for stickers - white vs transparent vs other.

21336 has stickered plates in character hands and i think i've seen a 1x1 (or almost 1x1) sticker somewhere, but i'm not sure of the latter.

Any reason why 75382 had a sticker on the round 1x1 tile?

Windscreen stickers still stress me out, requiring perfect alignment as well as perfectly clean surfaces. These sorts of stickers are absolutely the worst part of any such set, but a necessary evil I suppose. Anyone got any easy tips beyond the model-making decal techniques or just, 'get good'?

@poshhammer does the reversibility of error come into play when deciding for the use of a sticker or a printed part?

I mean, there are some parts for which it doesn't matter the "alignment" of the sticker: a 2x2 tile can be placed in four different orientations but as long as the sticker is aligned with one of the sides it doesn't matter which side you align it on.
A 2x2 round tile, on the other hand, is totally different: you can align the sticker in an infinite number of positions, but the part can be placed in only four different orientations.

There are also parts like the 1x2 cheese slopes, on which you may apply the sticker upside down, and then be stuck with it or risk damaging it trying to reapply it correctly.

@StyleCounselor said:
"Color-matching, what's up with that? "
Perhaps the sticker colour is perfect but the parts colour is varying...

I suppose "every set is someone's first set" repeated like mantra when the phonebook-size instructions argument comes up doesn't work as well here, because there's real cost aka lower profit attached to the issue.

"Or do you still think this flies in the face of the slogan “Only the best is good enough”?"
I do. I'm aware that doing more prints as is would be a logistical nightmare and would require some real money put into it. But then I remember LEGO put a nice billion into Epic Games and my gripes about LEGO's quality somehow feel less like "entitlement".

The Coruscant Guard Gunship has two stickers on 1x1 cheese slopes near the cockpit. I managed to put them on perfectly using a hack I discovered. If you use the edge of the brick separater to apply the sticker it makes it easier for smaller pieces with stickers.

One thing I never understood was when the checkered flag piece was available as a print in the Junior sets 2014's 10673 Race Car Rally and 2017's 10745 Florida 500 Final Race, but if you bought any of the Speed Champions sets released during that same time, you had to have it as a sticker for the exact same thing. The piece was in-print and had been around since 1988, why was it not put into those more expensive sets?

Just an observation. The smallest sticker I ever saw was a warning sign on the 42080 and it was less than a stud large!

Having somehow missed the first sticker article, so had to catch up before reading this one (though not having the time or energy to read all the comments).

Now having read both it will be nice to no longer have to suffer the constant whining about stickers on here ... oh.

I have an unrelated question for a future "What's Up With That?" article:
What reasoning goes behind adding and retiring specific brick colors?

I have heard some of the story behind why the grays and browns were replaced with bleys and reddish brown many years ago, but there are a lot of other colors that have been retired too. I believe trans red orange was just retired recently, which is a shame for the new Ice Planet 2002 figure in the recent collectible minifigures series.

"They will not put stickers on 1x1 elements or on the sides of plates..."

...Anymore? If you lived through the nightmare of Tiny Turbos Racers....

Now about: no stickers on 1x1 parts. Why did they decide to place a sticker on a 1x1 round tile of the UCS TIE Interceptor? That was a drag to get it centered despite it being a round piece.

Not sure if there will be a part Three, but the material used for transparant stickers is totally different from the opaque ones. Try putting on a transparant sticker on a transparant brick. No room for errors or fingerprints. Just awful. That is also why there were two stickersheets for the cockpit of 10240 X-Wing. Even if you made an error and decide to use the extra stickersheet the removed stickers leave glue marks on the transparant cockpit. And this cockpit needed 3 transparant stickers. The horror!

Another interesting article but it still doesn't address the issue as to why TLG restrict printing in the first place - especially on large, expensive sets. Cost is always cited but other smaller companies seem to manage to print all/most bricks and, more to the point, TLG could stop throwing money at the other cr*p they produce and concentrate on their actual raison d'etre. All IMHO of course.

I only read Brickset. Please don’t guilt me for not subscribing elsewhere.

"If you want to hear more about the design decisions behind AFOLs' favourite LEGO set, 21339 BTS Dynamite..."

I picked the wrong day to stop sniffing glue.

@poshhammer I just subscribed - twice.

I'm sticker neutral but a very interesting pair of articles. I'd love an article about set budgets in whatever way you see fit.

@Rabrickzel said:
""But unfortunately, my YouTube channel is nowhere near that number, which means some of you have not been liking and subscribing to my channel as instructed. Now, I won't ask the offenders to come forward, but this can be easily rectified by clicking HERE."

I'll be honest stuff like this just makes me not want to subscribe or view channel. I usually tend to leave dislike if person in video asks for likes. I like video if I like it and I subscribe if I find content interesting, but I'll decide that on my own.

"
The obsession with mentioning the youtube channel is making me not want to even read the articles..

"AFOLs' favourite LEGO set, 21339 BTS Dynamite"... really???

The stickers are not inherently good or evil. But the designers often make poor choices deciding when to use them. Most of the damage comes from budgetary limitations, of course.

Look at the review for 10341 - the one negative suggests some hard to apply stickers for £220! I know me - If I spend that much money on a set and then fudge-up the application of stickers, it really takes away from the pleasure of building. And it's not like they add a spare set of stickers in case you do.

@Terreneflame said:
" @Rabrickzel said:
""But unfortunately, my YouTube channel is nowhere near that number, which means some of you have not been liking and subscribing to my channel as instructed. Now, I won't ask the offenders to come forward, but this can be easily rectified by clicking HERE."

I'll be honest stuff like this just makes me not want to subscribe or view channel. I usually tend to leave dislike if person in video asks for likes. I like video if I like it and I subscribe if I find content interesting, but I'll decide that on my own.

"
The obsession with mentioning the youtube channel is making me not want to even read the articles..
"

It’s a running joke. The author is not at all serious.

I find it creative, like how is the author going to tie in their YouTube channel this time, without being repetitive.

Yes they put stickers on difficult if not complex curves.

Stickers just look like shit and wear off over time in any case. Colours do not match and it is a pain applying them correctly. If you fail in putting them straight and clean the whole set has a taint and I get angry each time I look at it. Espescially for the highprice sets an absolute NO GO. Look at the competition and see how it is done.

@Terreneflame said:
" @Rabrickzel said:
""But unfortunately, my YouTube channel is nowhere near that number, which means some of you have not been liking and subscribing to my channel as instructed. Now, I won't ask the offenders to come forward, but this can be easily rectified by clicking HERE."

I'll be honest stuff like this just makes me not want to subscribe or view channel. I usually tend to leave dislike if person in video asks for likes. I like video if I like it and I subscribe if I find content interesting, but I'll decide that on my own.

"
The obsession with mentioning the youtube channel is making me not want to even read the articles..
"

Then by all means, don’t read the article. It’s easy to ignore that bit, and it really is just a bit. The YouTube provides the same type of content, so it makes sense to let people know that it exists, since if they like the article, they might also like the videos.

And just like people saying they’re sick of Lego prices and stickers but continue to buy, I’m sure you’ll continue to read the articles.

"For people asking why "premium 18+ models" have stickers, the best reason that could be given is down to the SaP allocations. This is done on a per-team basis. For example, if you get X number of SaPs in, say, LEGO Ninjago, there will be common design elements and decos throughout multiple products in a wave, so they can share them with others. However, each LEGO Icons or LEGO Ideas set is a new IP, with a bunch of Minifigures unique to that set, which are never used again. So, even if the team gets more SaPs, I don't think it would ever be enough, especially with external IP models."

This may be very well and true, but at some point Lego just has to change these guidelines for specific models. A €300-€800 display model is a huge investment and something like that should have all prints, to make the quality last longer. I'm sure the huge profit margins ensure that they can absorb such extra costs. And as pointed out elsewhere, smaller companies can get away with it while presumably still making a profit.

The latest Star Wars UCS Tie Interceptor 75382 has one sticker that is applied on a 1x1 round tile unfortunately.

I think that the UCS line should be like the Modular Building Collection and not have stickers. It's ridiculous that they used stickers on the Venator 75367 when it costs a whopping 650 USD!

I don't mind stickers. I use tweezers to apply them, and use a large plate (4x8 or so) to hold smaller parts while doing so.

But I really hate opaque backing- the color matching is usually poor, and transparent backing would allow me to use the sticker on a different color piece.

@Wellspring said:
" @Terreneflame said:
" @Rabrickzel said:
""But unfortunately, my YouTube channel is nowhere near that number, which means some of you have not been liking and subscribing to my channel as instructed. Now, I won't ask the offenders to come forward, but this can be easily rectified by clicking HERE."

I'll be honest stuff like this just makes me not want to subscribe or view channel. I usually tend to leave dislike if person in video asks for likes. I like video if I like it and I subscribe if I find content interesting, but I'll decide that on my own.

"
The obsession with mentioning the youtube channel is making me not want to even read the articles..
"

It’s a running joke. The author is not at all serious.

I find it creative, like how is the author going to tie in their YouTube channel this time, without being repetitive. "
Traditionally jokes are funny.

@JukeLimited said:
"RE: "complex curve" / complex geometries, does everyone else just innately know how to "properly" apply stickers to parts like the not-flat "flat panel" Technic designs 64782 and 15458? Do you push the sticker down into the lowered parts, or leave it floating, or choose chaos and apply to yourself or the nearest pet?

Separately, does Brickset have an easy way to query sets by if they have stickers or prints or both or neither? Prints would likely be unexciting since I believe those are unique elements from their undecorated versions, and a lot of themes would just be "every set" given how often common control panels are used. And every set with a minifig would likely be flagged as having prints of course. But there are some exceptions ( 40516 has no prints or stickers, /and/ it has minifigs, being an edge case for both of those common assumptions). Might provide for some interesting analysis on frequency of sets with stickers vs sets with prints vs neither over time or across certain themes, prices, and so on."

Bricklink's set inventories will show the sticker sheet (if there is one) and printed parts.

@Terreneflame said:
" @Wellspring said:
" @Terreneflame said:
" @Rabrickzel said:
""But unfortunately, my YouTube channel is nowhere near that number, which means some of you have not been liking and subscribing to my channel as instructed. Now, I won't ask the offenders to come forward, but this can be easily rectified by clicking HERE."

I'll be honest stuff like this just makes me not want to subscribe or view channel. I usually tend to leave dislike if person in video asks for likes. I like video if I like it and I subscribe if I find content interesting, but I'll decide that on my own.

"
The obsession with mentioning the youtube channel is making me not want to even read the articles..
"

It’s a running joke. The author is not at all serious.

I find it creative, like how is the author going to tie in their YouTube channel this time, without being repetitive. "
Traditionally jokes are funny.
"

And as we all know, humor is 100% objective.

i have the amelia earhart tribute and her map held in her hand is stickered, and also like everything in speed champions i have has at least 2-4 1x1 stickers. and various logos on steering wheels in large technic sets.

@HDanke said:
"21336 has stickered plates in character hands and i think i've seen a 1x1 (or almost 1x1) sticker somewhere, but i'm not sure of the latter."

I believe some of the Tiny Trubo sets had 1x1 stickers on cheese slope pieces

Are there some LEGO pieces which cannot be printed on, so a sticker must be used?

For example, I’m thinking like those wall pieces with a large smooth section inset into the piece. Usually there is a big sticker put in there. I think they have them in the Rivendell set. Idk if I ever seen a printed version. Maybe they must be a sticker due to printing limitations of the factory machines?

hate to be a "But what about this set?" type comment, but
"They will not put stickers on 1x1 elements, the smallest sticker is on a 1x2 tile"
the 1x1 tiles on the back of 76188 would disagree. (though I have never seen other examples, and was VERY surprised to find they were stickers when building it)

I was quite disappointed that 76188 had 2 1x1 stickers for the parachutes.

My issue with stickers is static electricity. I use tweezers or the end of a brick separator to help apply them precisely, but when I am approaching the brick, static electricity causes the edge of the sticker to get attracted to the brick, throwing off my alignment.

@Wellspring said:
" @Terreneflame said:
" @Rabrickzel said:
""But unfortunately, my YouTube channel is nowhere near that number, which means some of you have not been liking and subscribing to my channel as instructed. Now, I won't ask the offenders to come forward, but this can be easily rectified by clicking HERE."

I'll be honest stuff like this just makes me not want to subscribe or view channel. I usually tend to leave dislike if person in video asks for likes. I like video if I like it and I subscribe if I find content interesting, but I'll decide that on my own.

"
The obsession with mentioning the youtube channel is making me not want to even read the articles..
"

It’s a running joke. The author is not at all serious.

I find it creative, like how is the author going to tie in their YouTube channel this time, without being repetitive. "

I mean, he does want people to subscribe, but it's definitely jokey. A sizeable portion of the Brickset fan base is so dour. No fun allowed! "You know the rules, this isn't a toy!"

My favorite quote from this feature is "Now with all this information, I am sure there will be comments like “but what about this set? By what you said they shouldn't have stickers!” and you would be right." There the Brickset audience was happy to oblige.

"If you want to hear more about the design decisions behind AFOLs' favourite LEGO set, 21339 BTS Dynamite..."

That did make me smile. Cheers James, keep it up! These articles are great.

My main takeaway from this article is that there's one design team working on all of the video game stuff lol

"They will never put a sticker over multiple elements… any more."
As someone who was a big Tiny Turbos fan as a kid, I felt that

I wouldn't mind stickers as much as I do if they still were of the quality they had when I was a kid in the Eighties. Those stickers were of a vinyl like material that was easy to apply and reapply and still stuck to the pieces perfectly for decades. Plus the colour matching was perfect. I still have an entire drawer in my parts collection with stickered pieces from back then that all look amazing.

I don't know why LEGO changed from that material to the cheap crap they are using nowadays, let alone the horrible disintegrating kind they used around the turn of the Millennium.
Cheaping out would be my guess, as per usual.

As for YouTube, I watch it on our TV via the app, but on that there's no way to like or subscribe (or read/write comments). Plus I don't have a YouTube account anyway, so couldn't subscribe even if I wanted to.

@poshhammer said:
" I noticed that these articles get 10,000+ views on Brickset. Which first of all, THANK YOU all for reading and discussing in the comments!"

Part of the reason for that is that the view count goes up every time is clicked on, even by the same user (So at least 20 of those views are mine), but we can only like and subscribe once ;)

I am also quite annoyed by the constant bombardment of "subscribe" and "like". YouTube is full of people trying to monetize Lego already.

Could there be a standard disclaimer somewhere up top, outside of the main text, stating this?

"This article has been provided by XXX, who also runs YT channel YYY - please visit."

I am not a fan of being guilted into liking/subscribing to someone's YT channel when reading articles on a different media (Brickset) altogether. The ethics of that is dubious.

Thank you, @poshhammer, for generously providing another informative article!

For the price of sets now, seeing how profitable Lego is they not ever going out of business, and have zero compaction. THERE is absolutely no reason why there are stickers on any set costing over $100 dollars. And they need to use a clear background for all sets.

@poshhammer This might be too behind the curtain, but have The Lego Group ever considered making stickers out of that reusable vinyl material you sometimes see in kids play scene books, so they could be peeled off and applied again or re-applied to different parts without damaging the sticker or part?

These articles are fascinating and well done, thank you! And no, I have no intention of following you on YouTube, because I appreciate well done articles and hate video content. I don't think I'm the only one -- it may explain some of why you get a lot of clicks on these articles! : )

In 76440 12 nearly identical stickered 2x4 tiles are used. These are candidates to be printed, but I wonder if that wasn't in the budget because of the sails. What is up with fabric (or vinyl) parts? In the first few years of Star Wars and Harry Potter capes were abundant, yet now seem to have been phased out for all but a handful of characters. Some caped characters like Doctor Strange and Batman have been now getting rubber capes.

@poshhamner - thank you again for these articles. I always manage to learn at least one thing. Today, it was happily 2!

1) SaP allocations are being done on a per-team basis. This is a surprise as I had been under the impression that every set was on its own.

2) A vocal (if not large) segment of the Brickset community apparently struggle with humor, and maybe punctuation. Let’s all keep them in our thoughts as they courageously fight this uphill battle.

@poshhammer:
Voltron wasn't even the first use of stickers in Ideas. Even excluding the two Japanese sets, TBBT was the first wide release with two stickers, and Old Fishing Store had eleven. TBBT used them on parts that I don't believe had ever been printed before, so that may have been forced on them, but OFS put them on regular tiles. OFS also put them on parts that haven't been printed before, so would that have been a case of "as long as we have to do a sticker sheet anyways"?

You also mention stickers providing a clean white background, which raises two other issues. One is that they used to print a base layer of white for just this reason, and this practice has long since been abandoned. The other is that white stickers often look bad compared to clear stickers. So, why did white base layers go away, and why are clear stickers used so sparingly?

@Belboz:
If you read both articles, each theme is allowed a certain number of new elements. These have to be split between prints and recolors, and probably also include any new molds (as every color is technically a "recolor"). The Mario design team opted to give up freedom of recolors in favor of using prints over stickers (ironically excluding the pre-applied code stickers). A theme like SW obviously focuses more on expanding the lineup of minifigs, which also have to be factored into this. Using so many of these on minifig parts means recolors for basic parts become increasingly precious, and giving one up to turn a single sticker into a print is a tough pill to swallow, especially if you still have a dozen stickers left. Eliminating the stickers from a single set could eat up the entire annual new element budget for the full theme. Then all the other sets have to get by without any recolors, on top of still being stuck with sticker sheets of their own.

@Wellspring:
Humor can be highly subjective. I've seen comments complaining when there's no mention of the channel, and I've seen comments complaining if there's even a subtle mention. Catch-22.

@versatilefundesigns:
10232 and 10326?

@Wellspring:
Mario code tiles are the main exception that I'm aware of. They tried prints. They tried sticker sheets. They determined that pre-applied stickers was the hardest-wearing solution for a part that's going to have the Mario charactes slammed down on it regularly.

@chrisaw:
It sounds like you're referring to Colorforms, which tend to lose their grip over time because they're not actually stickers. They depend on static electricity, which dissipates. So, if you don't want to lose them, you'd have to peel them off and reapply them on a regular basis.

@Wellspring said:
"Are there some LEGO pieces which cannot be printed on, so a sticker must be used?

For example, I’m thinking like those wall pieces with a large smooth section inset into the piece. Usually there is a big sticker put in there. I think they have them in the Rivendell set. Idk if I ever seen a printed version. Maybe they must be a sticker due to printing limitations of the factory machines?"
Stickers on inset walls like these are often the most difficult for me. At least they’re usually rectangle in nature so I can put most of my effort into only one side. The problem is understanding how much smaller they are than the piece so you end up with a similar gap on all sides.

@PurpleDave said:
" @versatilefundesigns:
10232 and 10326?
..."

Palace Cinema 10232 from 2013 was the last time stickers were used in the Modular Building Collection. Due to negative feedback from fans, LEGO decided to never include stickers in that series. The Natural History Museum 10326 has vinyl banners but no stickers, the difference being that there is no need to stick them on an element.

@Belboz said:
"Another interesting article but it still doesn't address the issue as to why TLG restrict printing in the first place - especially on large, expensive sets. Cost is always cited but other smaller companies seem to manage to print all/most bricks and, more to the point, TLG could stop throwing money at the other cr*p they produce and concentrate on their actual raison d'etre. All IMHO of course."

This is just my educated guess, but it's actually easier for smaller companies. Lego produces thousands of sets at any given time, and they're produced in multiple factories worldwide. This means that they need to have tens of thousands of unique parts in production and stored somewhere in the factory, and they need to have this capability exactly in all locations. So let's say they have 30.000 bins in their warehouse, where robots can pick out any part for a given bag for a given set. That number would be very definitive, they can't just add 30.010 bins because there's not room. So they'll aim for efficiency and have close to that, like 29.000 different parts at least at any given time to allow for flexibility.

If they wanted to have every stickered part printed, let's say there's 10 stickered parts in every set and there's a thousand sets being produced. That means they need to store another 10.000 bins. Sure, let's build the warehouse bigger to have 40.000 bins. But a) this means that it will take longer for the robots to physically go everywhere they need to go so production takes longer. And b), you will need to add these 10.000 bins in every factory. And there may not be room to just expand the factory. You may have room for an expansion in Denmark but not in Mexico, and so on. Not to mention that those will be huge undertakings that will cost hundreds of millions across all these factories, so "Mike Psiaki really wanted a ton of prints in this" or "some adult fans really want no stickers" is not a good enough argument. Sure, it comes down to money, Lego could just buy out everything in the surrounding area and expand their factories infinitely, but even Lego doesn't have infinite money. And eventually an infinite factory means it takes an infinite amount of time to make a set too, so...

Meanwhile, a smaller company will produce much fewer sets at any given time, so they can assign more unique parts to those sets over their lifetime. And they can produce everything in one location and then ship it across the world because unlike Lego they don't even pretend to care about the environment.

That's just my assumption based on having seen lots of documentaries about Lego factories, but it's probably something James can't officially talk about.

@oukexergon said:
""They will not put stickers on 1x1 elements or on the sides of plates..."

...Anymore? If you lived through the nightmare of Tiny Turbos Racers...."

@bnic99 said:
"hate to be a "But what about this set?" type comment, but
"They will not put stickers on 1x1 elements, the smallest sticker is on a 1x2 tile"
the 1x1 tiles on the back of 76188 would disagree."

In addition to numerous Tiny Turbos and 76188, other sets with stickers on 1x1 square tiles include 21336 , 40190, 42078, 75828, 75871, 75872, 75874, 75876, 75879, 75885, 75887, 75899, 75894, and 76161, with the most recent occurring in a 2022 Ideas set (The Office).

Sets with stickers on 1x1 round tiles include 10248 , 41124, 42043, 42048, 42056, 42106, 42129, 70616, 71044, 75281, 75382, 75968, and 76023 . The most recent is the UCS Tie Interceptor released this month.

42083 has a sticker on one of the tiles with one flat side and one rounded side.

Several of those sets cost at least $200.

@poshhammer said
"Special focal points in models, such as car headlights and faces, should also be printed."
I agree with you -- they should -- which is why I was shocked to see the headlights are stickers in the already outrageously priced 76274. Two of the minifigures are included in another set, and outside of the third minifigure, it does not appear that there are any additional prints. I guess they used all their SaPs for earth blue re-colors because if not...

This is a good explanation from a designer/employee’s point of view, but a more relevant perspective would be from someone higher up in the chain, i.e. the people deciding “increased number of SAP:s” vs “record-breaking profits”

@HuskyDynamics said:
" @StyleCounselor said:
"Color-matching, what's up with that?

Are the graphic designers drunk when they do their finals, or are the print technicians drunk when they do their set ups?

Someone, somewhere has a problem."

It's most likely related to the background color. If you use the same red print on a white part as on a black part, the one on the black part will come out looking darker. The compromise that TLG has (probably) made is to just use the same inks regardless of the color of part being printed in order to optimize the manufacturing process, which results in inconsistent colors."

Yeah, that's surely the 'how' of poor color-matching. I'm much more interested in the 'why' it occurs (despite my facetious derogatory question).

Why is there such poor color-matching? We know it's economics. What exactly are they skimping on, and what is the justification, especially on a $650 set like the Venator or Razor Crest?

Alright, so if we are saddled with having to accept stickers due to logistics, and it's a more economical way to add design into a set, then what's preventing TLG from including more than one copy of each sticker sheet? That could help alleviate situations where a sticker was ruined on initial application or later on down the road when a sticker wears out or starts separating from the part.

With an extra in-hand, customers wouldn't need to try and acquire a replacement sticker sheet from customer support especially if that set has retired by the time they get around to building it (and it's stock of stickers has long since vanished from TLG's supply chain).

I enjoy these designer articles with insights behind the scenes, but unfortunately I'm left with a lot of questions that go beyond a designer's point of view. I can appreciate that designers have to work within the restrictions they are given, but those rules seem a lot more arbitrary than they are presented. SaPs are a made up internal metric. I know there are entire teams calculating these numbers using data, logistics and financial analysis, but margins can vary and still be very profitable.

The Saturn V was considered by many to be a perfect set, with all the quality printed elements playing a big part of that. It clearly sold well enough to be rereleased with an extended production run. I certainly understand the logic behind special stickers like ones with a shiny background, but it's hard to accept the explanation for stickers in places where prints would absolutely work and be preferred by most fans.

@HuskyDynamics said:
"It's most likely related to the background color. "

I believe it's more related to the printing process: When I ordered some labels from a printing company, I gave them RAL® color index numbers as a definition. They weren't able to match these exactly since they are using four colour mixing (CMYK?).
If you check the Pantone® color indices you'll find that there is a special palette for colouring plastic material.
On top of that you need to consider the differences of the surface finish between stickers and parts...

Thank you to those who responded to my post. I appreciate the input.

However, I have to take issue with this idea of 'infinite expansion at great cost'. LEGO would not require infinite space because their product is finite. The number of sets they produce at any given time is more or less fixed because they constantly retire sets. AFAIK they also retire certain styles and colours of bricks. That means they can re-use the 'space' previously taken by the ones they no longer need (as the sets/pieces are being retired) for the newer pieces.

Of course, it's a lot more complicated than that and I appreciate that smaller companies will find it easier to print all their pieces but I cannot accept that this is not 'doable' by a massive company like LEGO. Remember, I was aiming my ire at stickers in the more expensive sets and not across the board.

I have said before that I have returned to LEGO after almost half a century. As a returning 'newbie' it appears to me that LEGO have lost their way somewhat and, instead of concentrating on their core product, have tried to branch out into other areas to the detriment of the quintessential product - the LEGO sets (and the LEGO bricks of which they are made)

Printing and no stickers on the more expensive sets would cost money - yes. I fully understand it would be difficult but, IMHO, LEGO would serve their customer base far better by concentrating on areas like this rather than throwing time and money at non-core fripperies.

I think they would most likely sell more sets too.

@Belboz said:
"Thank you to those who responded to my post. I appreciate the input.

However, I have to take issue with this idea of 'infinite expansion at great cost'. LEGO would not require infinite space because their product is finite. The number of sets they produce at any given time is more or less fixed because they constantly retire sets. AFAIK they also retire certain styles and colours of bricks. That means they can re-use the 'space' previously taken by the ones they no longer need (as the sets/pieces are being retired) for the newer pieces.

Of course, it's a lot more complicated than that and I appreciate that smaller companies will find it easier to print all their pieces but I cannot accept that this is not 'doable' by a massive company like LEGO. Remember, I was aiming my ire at stickers in the more expensive sets and not across the board.

I have said before that I have returned to LEGO after almost half a century. As a returning 'newbie' it appears to me that LEGO have lost their way somewhat and, instead of concentrating on their core product, have tried to branch out into other areas to the detriment of the quintessential product - the LEGO sets (and the LEGO bricks of which they are made)

Printing and no stickers on the more expensive sets would cost money - yes. I fully understand it would be difficult but, IMHO, LEGO would serve their customer base far better by concentrating on areas like this rather than throwing time and money at non-core fripperies.

I think they would most likely sell more sets too."
I'm completely with you on all accounts, but I think what it comes down to essentially is this:

LEGO is a business. They are first and foremost interested in maximising their profits.
Now we always like to see LEGO as our "friend" who is interested in their customers.
Let me tell you a secret - they are not. The only thing LEGO is interested in is getting as much of our money for the least effort possible. And that's what they are doing. They trick us by throwing out slogans like "only the best is good enough" (which anyone with eyes should have found out by now is total BS when comparing LEGO with the competition).
The only thing keeping the company from going under is the fact that their brand recognition, which they have built over decades (and in no small amounts due to the high quality they actually did provide decades ago), is so high.
But I am sensing a change starting to happen. Slowly but surely alternative manufacturers are getting more well known. People are beginning to find out that they can get far better value for money elsewhere. It's only a matter of time before the scales will begin to tip.
See it as an oil tanker, that once it has momentum is very hard to stop or change course - but it is possible, it just takes time and effort.
There's a reason why TLG is starting so many lawsuits on all fronts. They know that the longer they can keep the competition at bay, the longer they can keep amassing their insane profits.
Lowering the quality all the time while also raising prices way above the level of inflation adds to this. They simply want to make as much money as possible in the time they have. THAT imho is the main reason for all the skimping on quality we AFOLs who have been in the hobby for decades do notice. New customers might be satisfied for the very reason that they just don't know any better and can't compare to how good the quality used to be.
It's similar with cars. Sure, a Mercedes S-Class from 2024 has more features and better performance than one say from the Eighties, but the build quality and longevity of the car is where the new ones fall apart.

@AustinPowers said:
" @Belboz said:
"Thank you to those who responded to my post. I appreciate the input.

......."
I'm completely with you on all accounts, but I think what it comes down to essentially is this:
......
"

First of all, @poshhammer : thanks for another great article. And apologies for these few sourpusses on Brickset who instead of being grateful and respectful, insist on just calling you out for trying to grow your social media presence.

Now, @austinpowers . You are just taking your "wishes" for reality. Even during a difficult year for the toy industry, LEGO was one of the only ones that reported revenue growth (albeit a small one) last year. And yes, they report large profits, but they are using that profit to actually invest and try to improve (maybe not where some AFOLs want them to, but that is imo irrelevant from LEGO's pop). Just recently they seem to have finally switched over almost completely to new paper bags (which also require new boxes), they are building not one, but two new factories (Vietnam, and the USA (funny how people claiming that LEGO only produces in low-wage countries forget about this one)), they made the switch from Polycarbnate plastic (the production process of this IS toxic), to MABS for transparent pieces, and they continue to expand their line-up with new colours, new molds, new licenses, etc etc etc etc etc.... To just assume that they just put their profits in their pockets and do nothing with them sounds a bit as if you... do not want them to turn a profit, either out of spite or because of an ill-advised ideological stance?

Anyway. I notice that you and some others in the German-speaking part of the world seem to be a tad blinded by a few very vocal social influencers who represent a very vocal, but all in all quite insignificant part of the AFOL community, that is very vocal about its disdain for LEGO. A certain not so sympathetic, yet business-savvy influencer from the heart of Europe springs to mind. Of course these influencers are just influencing you for clicks and money, and they know it is way easier to sell negativity than positivity these days. And unfortunately, this leads to some people just blindly hating on LEGO, just because they think it is... cool? Boy, how wrong they are.

Finally, which alternative brands have better quality and are a threat to LEGO?
Bluebrixx? Yes, they are cheap. But, I built a few of their sets, and could not finish them due to either quality issues, or missing pieces. And good luck trying to get your missing pieces from them. It takes ages, if you get them at all. Imho they do not take away market share from LEGO (at least not significantly), but rather get more and other people interested in brick toys.
The Chinese manufacturers? They are way too small and insignificant in Europe and the US to be a threat. Most are not even interested to sell directly in Europe due to protected parts and the Minifig issue (btw, it is LEGO's right to forbid sales in Europe that contain those), and rather prefer to just use Temu, Aliexpress or any of the other sources for cheap Chinese crap in Europe. Sure, in China itself they will take away a large chunk of LEGO's share, but the Asian market as a whole is not that significant for LEGO (yet).
Cobi? They are in a completely different market segment. Apart from them using bricks to build there military models, there is literally zero overlap in the products they sell.
Mega? They seem to only offer sets with licenses (Halo, Pokemon, Masters of the Universe) that LEGO currently does not hold. Again, not really important.

So, LEGO is going nowhere imho. Sorry.

PS: Cars nowadays are way more reliable and safer than they have ever been. But, electronics make them more difficult and expensive to repair than old cars.

Somebody mentioned the Mario barcode sticker situation. They are using stickers for hard-wearing surfaces, where you would expect a print. But the pre-applied stickers in the Mario sets are produced in a different way then ‘normal’ stickers. The Mario stickers are printed ‘under surface’. This means that the print is on the back of the plastic material. After the printing the material is coated with an white adhesive. When the sticker is applied the top of the plastic material is protecting the printed barcode that is sandwiched between the plastic and the adhesive material.

@Belboz said:
"I have said before that I have returned to LEGO after almost half a century. As a returning 'newbie' it appears to me that LEGO have lost their way somewhat and, instead of concentrating on their core product, have tried to branch out into other areas to the detriment of the quintessential product - the LEGO sets (and the LEGO bricks of which they are made)"

If ypu think Lego is spreading themselves too thin now, be glad you weren't into the hobby around the turn of the century, when they were throwing anything and everything at the wall to see what stuck. If Bionicle hadn't stuck, Lego might be a subsidiary to some other company now. Yes, they were getting buyout offers, and those offers were being considered.

I can live with stickers on elements, for the most part. It's great they finally started printing UCS plaques, as those were too easy to misapply. Based on the lack of quality in many prints, I think stickers are the lesser evil. However, what TLG really needs to do is fix their printing issues. Things like minifig details extending onto leg pieces are absolutely necessary to print and should not suffer from color shift as badly as they do. Lay down that base white, then print over top. It's not difficult and it's definitely a choice TLG has made to not do this. As others have pointed out, other companies are doing printed elements better than TLG and for a fraction of the price.

@MrBedhead : I would really love to discuss some of these things with you in person, because here on Brickset this always takes the comment section too far off topic. Plus in real life I could show you examples of what I mean, which I can't in a comment section. Some things would be much clearer and easier to understand then. But that's not going to happen of course.

Suffice it to say that the opinions I have stem from my decades long experience with LEGO and not from some self-important YouTubers. Sure, some of their criticisms overlap with mine, but others don't.

The massive decline in quality of the LEGO product (meaning the materials of pieces, packaging, stickers and instructions, not the set designs themselves) is blatantly obvious to anyone who can compare a set from the Eighties with one from today. Perhaps the old materials were not as good for the environment (as well as TLG's profit margins), but better for the consumer. And the consumer is the one paying the money (which in turn is what keeps a company running), which is why "only the best is good enough" should indeed be the edict and not just the hollow phrase it is now.

As for my experiences with alternatives, they are apparently quite different from yours. For a start I only had one or two missing pieces in very early BlueBrixx sets, none in any current one, and one email to their customer service was enough to have the replacements in my letterbox barely a week later (when with LEGO I sometimes had to wait for months, and rarely less than one month). With LEGO I even had completely wrong bags in sets, something I never had with any other brand.
By the way I have yet to find paper bags in current sets. I had only one example so far, and that came in one of the standard pushtab boxes.

Manufacturers I by now consider superior in terms of quality of their bricks are Pantasy, Cobi, Qman and Funwhole. Just look at mould marks. Those from LEGO get worse every year (sadly enough even on part designs where mould marks were completely hidden in the past and now are hideously obvious). Or colour consistency. Or size tolerances.
I have built LEGO sets recently where tolerances were worse than on the (by you) much derided Lepin set I built years ago.
And as for the quality of prints, also often discussed already, some (not all of course) of the alternatives care enough to use a base coat of white on dark parts before printing the actual print so that the opacity of the final result is optimal. LEGO only uses a single print coat and it shows. Perfect example: the Piranha Plant I built last week. The white dots on the flower head (that by the way are shown as perfectly white on the packaging - deliberate false advertising) are pink on mine. Just one of countless examples.
The list goes on and on.
So yes, some of these points are also ones brought up repeatedly by some YouTubers, but in those cases the facts speak for themselves.

Lastly this is not meant as disrespectful towards the author of the article. He himself has mentioned that he doesn't know everything about the manufacturing processes. I highly appreciate his input, but not to sound condescending but I am way older than him and have built LEGO years before he was even born. Some things he just couldn't have experienced firsthand at the time.

@AustinPowers said:
" @MrBedhead

Lastly this is not meant as disrespectful towards the author of the article. He himself has mentioned that he doesn't know everything about the manufacturing processes. I highly appreciate his input, but not to sound condescending but I am way older than him and have built LEGO years before he was even born. Some things he just couldn't have experienced firsthand at the time. "

Ah yes, the old “I’m going to be condescending but tell you I’m not, so it’s fine”.

@poshhammer said:
" @Wellspring @Rabrickzel The time spent discussing this in the comments is time that COULD be spent liking and subscribing.... "

That got me to subscribe. I love your sense of humor and these articles are very insightful!

I'm not usually a sticker hater but 76271 is an outlier for me. The Art sets are wonderful building experiences but the addition of 61 stickers was very irritating. The set was fun to build and looks beautiful on display but applying stickers from the first bag to the last bag did not make for an enjoyable building experience, especially when some of them certainly could have been printed. Not to mention the stickers weren't cut well and the light bluish gray color matching was awful.

I'm not one to say that LEGO® sets have decreased in quality across the board - in fact, I think some areas have greatly improved in quality. I also don't think every decoration needs to be printed but it would be nice to have more attention paid to the stickers so they look better on completed models.

@monkyby87 said:
" @AustinPowers said:
" @MrBedhead

Lastly this is not meant as disrespectful towards the author of the article. He himself has mentioned that he doesn't know everything about the manufacturing processes. I highly appreciate his input, but not to sound condescending but I am way older than him and have built LEGO years before he was even born. Some things he just couldn't have experienced firsthand at the time. "

Ah yes, the old “I’m going to be condescending but tell you I’m not, so it’s fine”."
Well, how else would you have phrased the fact that one has firsthand experience with something that due to an apparent age difference another person does not?

And @GoldenNinja3000: I would be interested to know which areas you feel "have greatly improved in quality"? Try as I might I can't think of a single one.

@AustinPowers said:
" @MrBedhead :
Lastly this is not meant as disrespectful towards the author of the article. He himself has mentioned that he doesn't know everything about the manufacturing processes. I highly appreciate his input, but not to sound condescending but I am way older than him and have built LEGO years before he was even born. Some things he just couldn't have experienced firsthand at the time. "
There is no use in debating LEGO quality with you. You clearly have a very negative view, while I see it completely differently. These are just opinions. Just like it is my opinion that you are completely biased by your own nostalgia.

However, your last comment, again, shows how condescending and arrogant you are, without even realizing it. The author clearly knows what he is talking about, and clearly states which things he cannot talk about, either due to an NDA or lack of knowledge. You, on the other hand, make some claims based on your memory of the past, and then use a lot of words to say that you do not mean to be condescending, while being incredibly condescending. You sound like my old man saying: "Now shut up, because I know better, because I am older than you." No you don't. You are just an older man thinking he knows things better than others, and thinking that his opinions somehow are more valuable because you have built soooooooo many LEGO sets and thus have waaaay more experience. In the meantime you are just an AFOL who knows nothing about design, manufacturing, plastics processing, environmental concerns, packaging and inventory management processes. If brickset would allow emojis, I would insert the "rollingeyes" one here.

Now, my rant is over.

@purpledave, I did not realise that they are switching to MABS for everything. I am just wondering why, since I understood they should be able to use the same molds for ABS and MABS, and MABS is kind of a transparent version of ABS. Might be completely wrong here however.

"They will not put stickers on 1x1 elements or on the sides of plates. I think the smallest sticker is on a 1x2 tile."

I've seen stickers on 1x1 elements plenty times in recent years:

40654 : 1x1 brick with a door sticker
21336 : post-it 1x1 tile
76161 : two 1x1 tiles with button sticker
76914 : two 1x1 bricks with vents sticker
76918 : two 1x1 bricks with blinker light sticker
40574 : 1x1 brick with eye sticker

and that's just from the last two years. If you look on Bricklink you can find a ton of decorated 1x1 bricks that use stickers: https://www.bricklink.com/catalogList.asp?pg=1&q=1x1+sticker&catLike=W&catString=118&sortBy=N&sortAsc=A&catType=P&v=2

Interestingly enough this is mostly a recent thing, between 74 and 2012 there have only been 15 of such bricks, while between 2016 and 2024 there have been 18.

@AustinPowers said:
" @MrBedhead said:
"You, on the other hand, make some claims based on your memory of the past... "
Huh?

I have those "memories from the past" sitting right in front of me and in several places in my house, just like I have their modern counterparts for direct comparison. And not just my own sets from my childhood but many more that I have bought over the years on ebay and Bricklink that I didn't get as a kid (like 6990 for example and yes, even the entire first wave of 1979 Classic Space).

And yes, I can even now in 2024 draw direct comparisons between sets from my childhood and modern ones. I can compare the packaging, the instruction manuals, the prints and stickers, and especially the parts quality to the current sets I am building - both from LEGO and the alternatives. Just an hour ago I finished my first Kiddicraft set by the way. The brand that Thorsten from "Johnny's World" recently revived with the help of Panlos, who manufacture the sets and figures for him.

Anyway, if you honestly don't understand that I am not making claims based on memories but based on the facts presented to me by the products I have right in front of me, then I give up. You apparently are even more biased than I thought."

Now we are playing the game “who is the most biased”? I just find different things important in a LEGO set than you. What you find important is in my opinion at least partially influenced by your nostalgia for what LEGO used to be.

Anyway, what is of importance to me in a LEGO set?

I find intricate designs important. I like IP based and licensed models from Disney, Harry Potter, DC, Marvel, because I love pop culture. I find the colourful and joyful design of modern designs important.

I just don't find stickers or colourful insides important issues. Same for some slightly visible mold marks. I can even let small colour differences in bricks pass, because I know how hard it is to get this 100& right in a global operation like LEGO. I also have zero interest in the umpteenth police station or fire brigade. And I definitely do not feel any nostalgia for old LEGO sets that just look like a bunch of stacked bricks to me. I mean, I understand the yellow castle was important, but does anybody really believe that LEGO would sell many of these if they were released now?

And I just strongly disagree that brick quality used to be better. I also strongly disagree that alternative bricks are better. Most Chinese bricks (mostly Gobricks) are full of microscratches. I do not like Cobi's tiles because they do not have the groove that allows easy disassembly. And I think Mega's bricks feel cheap.

LEGO's customer service is wonderful. I built hundreds of sets during the past decade(s). Have had maybe three missing or wrong pieces, and every time LEGO just sent me a new piece, no questions asked. They dont even verify if you bought the set. Also, i have had a few slightly damaged boxes in shipping. When I file a complaint online, every time they offered me the choice between 3000 insiders points or a replacement set, or just sent a replacement if it was a small set .

I just do not seen LEGO as this profit gauging mogul. Your comments here clearly show that you tend to actually see LEGO like that. Again, your opinion, but clearly not mine.

Finally, I think LEGO's design language is just unrivalled in the business.

Who knows, I might be just as biased as you? I just draw from my own experience.

@Belboz:
In the time you’ve been gone, they suffered two large annual losses within a short time, got a serious offer from Mattel to buy them out, imposed the very rules that make stickers so common to keep their logistics manageable, and then turned the company around and unseated Hasbro as the largest toy manufacturer in the world. They seem to be doing okay with the rules they put in place.

OttoT said:"I am delited that Boutique Hotel has zoro stickers and it was the main reason to buy it.
I also wanted to buy LotR: Rivendell but after watching a video with a ton of stickers I found the asking price too much because of all the stickers. I have to mention I suck at handeling stickers due to arthritis."

I've had limited use of my left hand since my stroke, and that doesn't make sticker application very easy, either. I almost always attach the piece I'm stickering to another piece, and then hold that.

@AustinPowers said:" @MrBedhead : ...My experiences with LEGO customer service are the direct opposite of yours. Perhaps they are more customer-oriented in Switzerland, who knows, but I have had far less positive experiences with them."

Over here in the States, the closest thing I've had to a bad experience with Lego CS is that their online CS chat didn't work in Firefox. Other than that very minor hiccup, they've always been great.

Oh boy, the comment section is even worse than I've feared.

But the problem is: Both sides of the argument are not entirely wrong.
Yes, TLG has managed to become the most successful toy company in the world - and even more: It succeded in making and promoting a product range that appeals to toddlers and adults. It has managed to stay relevant, to try out a myriad of things to appeal to as many people as possible. That is no small thing and TLG succeeds where other big names are struggling.

And: LEGO develops its product further, new materials, new packaging, focus on sustainability...
And yes, there are influencers whom I like to call 'Youtube dementors' - because they seem to feed on positive thoughts while exhaling negative ones.

But: LEGO IS cutting some corners on this road. Printing opacity, mold marks, colour inconsistenties ARE a thing and it is important to raise these issues again and again.
'Only the best is good enough' is a high standard, and as a man who has been building LEGO sets and playing with them since the mid-eighties, LEGO has slipped in some aspects.

For me the solution is simple: I buy (some of the) things that interest me and I am not personally and deeply offended if any set has not been specifically designed for my taste and price point.