NY Toy Fair press release
Posted by Huw,
Ahead of the New York Toy Fair this weekend, LEGO has issued a press release outlining what it will be displaying at the show. Take a seat and read it in its entirety after the break.
We hope to be able to bring you images from the show on Saturday, courtesy of The Brick Show who will also be providing video from the event on YouTube.
LEGO Systems Unveils Hundreds of New Building Sets to Spark Creative Play for Builders of All Ages and Interests
NEW YORK, Feb. 11, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- LEGO Systems, Inc. will showcase its collection of new building sets—over 300 new products—at this week's North American International Toy Fair. Among the new offerings is LEGO NEXO KNIGHTS, a new original LEGO property that depicts a medieval kingdom set in a futuristic world. New LEGO products are on display in booth #1635 in Hall 3B of New York City's Jacob K. Javits Convention Center from February 13-16.
"The LEGO system of play empowers children of all ages and interests to be creative, innovative and imaginative by snapping bricks together to bring their ideas to life. Our builders are only limited by their imaginations and we are excited to offer them more sets than ever before to inspire endless hours of creative play," said Søren Torp Laursen, president, LEGO Systems. "As a classic, creative play experience, we're energized by the opportunities to keep building our relationships with children and their families in order to invite more children into the LEGO brand and to keep them building during, and even beyond their childhood years."
Younger Builders (Ages 1½+)
LEGO DUPLO, with bricks two times the size of a classic LEGO brick, introduces children as young as 18 months to the world of LEGO building. Twenty-eight new DUPLO sets include classic themes such as My First Garden, Little Plane and Baby Animals, along with favorite licensed themes and characters including Disney's Junior Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Doc McStuffins. New to the DUPLO line this year is Disney's Junior Miles from Tomorrowland. Sets range from $9.99 to $99.99.
Featuring modular pieces and elements, such as walls and archways, plus step-by-step instructions to help young builders gain confidence as they get started, LEGO Juniors is the perfect age-appropriate building experience for builders who are new to classic LEGO bricks. Iconic themes provide a relevant and fun building experience with sets including Police Helicopter Chase andBatman & Superman vs. Lex Luthor. Also new for this year is MARVEL Ironman vs. Loki and Disney Princess Ariel's Dolphin Carriage. Sets range from $9.99 to $29.99.
Creative Building (Ages 5+)
LEGO Classic continues, offering a variety of brick collections that foster open-ended building fun such as the new LEGO Creative Building Set for $29.99. LEGO Creator offers vehicles, creatures and structures such as a Super Soarer, Park Animals andTreehouse Adventures, each with 3-in-1 building options, delivering hours of play value. Sets range from $4.99 to $69.99. Advanced builders will love the challenge of new LEGO Technic sets such as Hydroplane Racer and Heavy Lift Helicopter that offer technical elements like gears, beams, pulleys, actuators and pneumatics. Sets range from $12.99 to $279.99.
Themed Building (Ages 5+)
LEGO City puts a build-and-play spotlight on real-life heroes, packed with detailed models, exciting missions and humorous characters. Thirty-four new sets cater to a variety of interests, anchored by four new subthemes: Fire Response, Prisoner Island,Airport and Volcano Exploration, plus new items in the Great Vehicles theme. Sets range from $6.99 to $119.99.
LEGO Friends offers richly detailed building and role play centered on the adventures of five girls who reside in Heartlake City. Twenty-three building sets in new Adventure Camp, Birthday and Amusement Park subthemes, such as Adventure Camp Tree House, Birthday Party and Amusement Park Roller Coaster are complemented by digital and television content that will be introduced throughout the year. Sets range from $4.99 to $99.99.
LEGO Speed Champions lets builders create some of the fastest and most popular supercars in the world, such as the Ford Mustang GT, Audi R8 and Chevrolet Corvette Z06. Sets range from $14.99 to $69.99.
The second chapter of LEGO Elves features heroine Emily's return to the enchanted town of Elvendale to help her friends, the magical elves, save the majestic baby dragons and return them to their mother. Ten new sets, with accompanying digital content throughout the year, offer builders fantasy role-play and story starters including Elvendale School of Dragons, Fire Dragon's Lava Cave and The Secret Market Place. Sets range from $9.99 to $99.99.
The LEGO NINJAGO saga continues with new television episodes on Cartoon Network and 16 new building sets loaded with features and functions to provide hours of building and role play fun, including Ninja Bike Chase, The Lighthouse Seige, and Misfortune's Keep, available in March. Sets range from $9.99 to $119.99.
LEGO NEXO KNIGHTS is the newest original LEGO property that follows five young, brave knights who 'download' special powers to their shields in order to battle the royal court's evil Jestro and a cast of monsters to restore peace. The story comes to life through 28 new LEGO sets such as Clay's Rumble Blade and The Fortrex. An episodic television series on Cartoon Network and a digital gaming app that integrates with the products and television show fuel story-driven gameplay. Sets range from $9.99 to $119.99.
Licensed Building – The Walt Disney Company (Ages 5+)
Eight new LEGO | Disney Princess sets encourage children to build with timeless characters like Ariel and Jasmine or new favorites from Disney's Frozen – Anna and Elsa found in Arendelle Castle Celebration. Sets range from $12.99 to $54.99.
LEGO MARVEL Super Heroes brings characters from comic books and new movie releases to LEGO brick form, including sets corresponding with the 2016 theatrical release of Marvel's Captain America: Civil War and a new collection of sets based on Ultimate Spider-Man. New this year are collectible MARVEL Mighty Micros, each containing a Super Hero and a villain plus their vehicles such as Spider-Man vs. Green Goblin. Sets range from $12.99 to $119.99.
LEGO Star Wars adds 25 new sets in 2016 to the best-selling building collection. Sets are inspired by classic Star Wars films, the all new animated television series LEGO Star Wars: The Freemaker Adventures and the animated television show Star Wars Rebels, as well as the 2015 blockbuster Star Wars: The Force Awakens, plus scenes from the highly anticipated Star Wars: Rogue One film, ranging in price from $9.99 to $149.99. Continuing for the second year is a line of buildable figures for ages 6+ featuring iconic Star Wars characters, including Rey, Kylo Ren and Captain Phasma, providing a different kind of building experience and new play possibilities. Sets range from $19.99 to $34.99.
Licensed Building (Ages 5+)
Favorite DC Comics Super Heroes mark their 5th year in LEGO form in a new collection of building sets. LEGO DC Comics Super Heroes introduces three new Batman products, plus three new sets tied to Warner Bros. Pictures' highly anticipated new action adventure feature film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice coming to theatres on March 25, 2016. New this year are collectibleMighty Micros which each contain a DC Comics Super Hero, a DC Comics Super-Villain and their vehicles to provide opportunities for children to build and play with their beloved DC Comics characters in micro scale. Sets range from $9.99 to $79.99
New LEGO The Angry Birds Movie line brings Red and his friends to life in hilarious and action-packed building sets inspired byThe Angry Birds Movie. Six sets, including Piggy Pirate Ship and King Pig's Castle, feature special launching functions to inspire hours of play. Sets range from $12.99 to $89.99.
Building adventures of LEGO Minecraft continue to bring the creative possibilities of the hit virtual game to physical play. Five sets feature key moments and worlds from the game and include iconic characters and items true to the game's universe. Sets range from$19.99 to $109.99 and include key biomes such as The Jungle Tree House and The Fortress.
Constraction (Ages 6+)
The original constructible LEGO action figure line, LEGO BIONICLE, features 17 new building sets ranging from $9.99 to $24.99, including Unamarak the Hunter, Tahu Uniter of Fire and Pohatu Uniter of Stone.
Collectibles (Ages 5+)
LEGO Minifigures allow LEGO fans to collect and build their own minifigure population with 50 never-before-seen LEGO Minifigures debuting in three waves this year. Mystery packaging includes one figure each for $3.99.
The mini character building of LEGO MIXELS inspires creativity, imagination and hours of fun along the way. With three new series premiering this February, June and October, fans can collect 27 characters from the Mixels content seen on Cartoon Network. Sets are $4.99 each.
LEGO Architecture celebrates the past, present and future of architecture through the medium of the LEGO brick. Each set contains a book featuring step-by-step building instructions along with history, information and photos of the world's most iconic structures. All new Architecture city skylines feature the iconic buildings and landmarks of metropolises such as Berlin, New York City and Venice. Sets range from $29.99 to $59.99.
Through the online LEGO Ideas community, fans may propose their original designs to become new LEGO sets and then vote for their favorites. Each year, several submissions are approved, produced and sold as official LEGO sets. Available in April, LEGO Maze($69.99) lets fans build, customize and play a maze game.
LEGO Exclusives, available through shop.LEGO.com and LEGO Stores, give skilled builders a more challenging and complex building experience, such as the new LEGO Ghostbusters Firehouse Headquarters ($349) and LEGO Brick Bank ($169.99).
via PR Newswire
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19 comments on this article
A couple obnoxious errors I couldn't read this without noticing: "seige" is spelled wrong in the bit about Ninjago (and I'm pretty sure that set doesn't come out in March as the blurb implies), and the bit about Elves calls Elvendale a "town" (it probably ought to say "land" or "world" or something to that effect). Maybe I'm just nitpicking, but I can't shake the feeling that LEGO Systems Inc. needs a copy editor.
There was also another press release this morning about the company's US sales results for 2015: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/lego-systems-records-eleventh-consecutive-year-of-growth-in-us-toy-market-300218844.html Apparently sales here are still growing, especially in the girls' category. The top five themes here last year were Star Wars, City, Friends, Super Heroes, and Minecraft. Kind of surprised that LEGO Minecraft surpassed LEGO Ninjago over here considering what a small theme it is. But of course I know it sells well, better even than some of its designers can quite understand!
Cannot wait!
^^ and Unamarak the Hunter
@Aanchir - I could not agree more. Set descriptions are often littered with similar errors.
"50 never-before-seen LEGO Minifigures debuting in three waves".
So not just three waves of 16 figures?
well 16x3=48...so 2 figures unaccounted for.
Mr Gold-type collectibles perhaps?
hmmm... Mr Platinum? Mr Silver? Mr Uranium (for serious collectors only)?
18 in the Disney CMFs, remember? So it's 16+18+16 for a total of 50.
I'm surprised they even mentioned the Rogue One sets since I am sure we aren't going to be seeing any of them on display. I would be surprised if we even got set descriptions this early. Hopefully they unveil the UCS hoth or the collectible disney minifig series at the toy fair.
@Aanchir - I read the additional press release you included a link to. I get really aggravated with statements like this:
Continued robust double-digit sales growth to girls* in the U.S., with sales up +21% over 2014.
*combines LEGO® Friends, LEGO Disney Princess™, and LEGO Elves, but does not account for other LEGO themes sold to girls
Really?? So their assumption is that all Friends, Princess, and Elves sets are sold to girls? Did Lego really release that themselves?
Lazy categorization like that really bugs me. Even if they went with something like "girl-oriented themes" it wouldn't bother me, but just saying "girls" is the type of thing that makes so many people think Lego are just boy toys.
Looking at all the dragons in the next wave of Elves, the theme certainly would seem to be trying to appeal to both boys and girls. I'm glad some retailers like Target in the US have stopped separating the "girls" lines from the rest of the Lego, as both of my children (1 girl, 1 boy) like sets from across the spectrum of themes.
Not a word about Technic with two giant sets coming out?!
@Ronyar: Bear in mind that this is not LEGO's analysis of their own sales statistics — this is LEGO quoting an analysis of sales statistics by a third-party. From the press release: "NPD Retail Tracking Service data represents 80% of the U.S. toy retail market. As a privately held company, LEGO Systems does not disclose internal market performance data and offers third-party data for directional purposes." NPD probably doesn't have access to sales data that would tell them the gender makeup of the people buying each theme. And LEGO would probably like to keep it that way to avoid giving their competitors any clues on how to succeed with both genders the way they have.
Nevertheless, while the data collection may not be flawless, it reflects the reality that the LEGO brand's strength with girls continues to grow year by year. While there's no doubt that Elves can appeal to boys and girls alike (just as City or Ninjago can), it's probably safe to say the majority of its buyers are girls. If they weren't, then it would be making the gender ratios of LEGO fans more imbalanced, not less, which is the opposite of what it and LEGO Friends were designed to do.
@Alonzo Brickovsky: I believe the larger Technic sets are Toys 'R' Us exclusives in the United States, and so it's possible they wouldn't be on display at New York Toy Fair (which is largely a trade show). The larger Technic sets weren't on display at last year's NYTF either, though they were in the press guide: http://bzpower.com/story.php?ID=7388
@HugeYellowBrick & @Sethro3: Didn't we already know that the Disney CMFs would have 18 figs, not 16? I thought that information surfaced weeks ago.
^I was unaware of that news, but to be honest I haven't kept up to date with most news reveals.
Another error noticed: "new favorites from Disney's Frozen – Anna and Elsa found in Arendelle Castle Celebration. Sets range from $12.99 to $54.99." The biggest set (the Frozen Fever one) is $59.99.
Some interesting stuff here. We have confirmation that the Porsche is no more than $280, and the Rogue One stuff sounds interesting. I wonder what's $10, that's weird... and what could they possibly justify selling for $150 from this movie?!
I hope that photography of the Star Wars sets isn't prohibited because of the Rogue One sets :(
This seems to confirm that the three waves of CMFs will all stay at $3.99 and not rise to $4.99 as some have speculated for the Disney series. Unless of course that is another instance where Lego messed up the press release.
Is it the first time Maze's price (70$) has shown up?
Hey just a note for you guys. The Speed Champions is actually already available to. Infact Toys R Us already has them for sell and can be bought. They will also be delivered to you right now on the 23rd of February. So heads up for that. :)