Use legos strategi...

[Bolingbroke]

Well, they seem to have bounced back well enough, and both licences are still going strong. Star Wars sets fly off the shelves, at my local Bart Smit. This morning they only had one TIE fighter left, for eg. Even if it costs 57 euro.

[Rhalius]

It works for star wars yes, but all the other licenses arent exactly an improvement over the usual themes.

Pirates of the carribean theme is pathedic compared to the classic lego pirates. I still can't believe they dropped that theme.

Lego does seem to have trouble substaining historic themes.. I believe they had none during their troubled years, aside from power ranger knights that cant even be called medieval anymore.

Why did they only have one batch of cowboys for example? as far as I know it was succesfull. Pirates was very popular too, same for knights and lego's own space themes yet they seem to trade everything in for licenses.

While Playmobil definatly seems to have been far more succesfull with historic themes than lego, they could still learn a lot from the Lego space themes before they started with licenses.  Playmobil space was never really a bit hit, and while the newest batch has potential it's still rather limited compared to the monorails, huge space ships, prisons and most things Lego has done with it.

[playmofire]

Well, they seem to have bounced back well enough,

They boinced back at a cost by selling Legoland, for example.  In addition, since they lost a court case over whether the brick system could be patented, a number of other firms have started using the system.

[Luis]

oh, no licencing please!

playmobil has done a great job being original

[PlaymoMan]

oh, no licencing please!

playmobil has done a great job being original

I know! That's one of the reasons I buy Playmobil instead of Lego.

[Bolingbroke]

Oh really? So it's ideological, is it?

It's absurd. Lego has many unlicensed themes.

 

[Rhalius]

I'd recommend getting old sets through bricklink any day though instead of buying new lego from the stores.

While for playmobil I'd say some themes have seen better days, they have some very strong themes at any time still, even now. For lego all the best stuff is long gone, but that might just be my opinion. Sure there is star wars, but thats a license.

Lego peaked in the late eighties, early ninetees.
Great pirates that inspired adventure with its many treasure islands, many beautifull ships, forts of various sizes and even a large trade post. 
Plenty of great castles, decorated knights, army builder sets, forestmen and even some medieval civilian sets.
Harbour theme was also strong, with a large and smaller cargo harbour at the same time and the only speedboat harbour ever released.
Space was one great faction after another, always with another focus for each faction. Blacktron where the bad guys with their cool black spacesuits, M-tron had all kinds of ground transports and used lots of magnets, Iceplanet focused on an ice theme, Exploriens focused on finding and examening fosils, UFO had its aliens and robots combined with saucer shaped space ships.
Plenty of city building as well, with buildings other than a police station and firestation. There where also hospitals, a pizzeria, a cafe, various houses, stables, a bank, forrest homes, etc.

[Donmobil]

LEGO started going down hill when their sets were produced with too many specialty pieces.  The best part of LEGO is taking the sets apart and using these elements and making MOCS  (my own creation).

LEGO is also probably the only major company to attend conventions and mingle with consumers.  The main thing they heard was "Go back to the brick".  That is not so many specialty pieces and more elements, and their sales went up.  At one time, I believe 2000 was the first LEGO con.  Now there are 4 or5 cons per year across the US.

In LEGO, I believe, the minifigs are to enhance their construction sets.  In Playmobil, the main feature is the Klicky with scenery to enhanse it.

Playmobil, in my opinion, needs to be more present in the USA, a lot of workers in Target, Walmart, and ToysRUs have not even heard of Playmobil.  ToysRUs carries some Playmobil, but only carries the box sets and what they think will sell.  The have a wide range of modern era sets, the Dino range and the Western sets.  The clercks there knew they carried Playmobil but were not aware of the many other sets Playmobil has.

-- Donmobil

[Rhalius]

I'd imagine the western sets would be more popular in the USA than other parts of the world, its popular everywhere but surely its more interesting to the nation whose history its portraying? Theres even northern and southern soldiers.

[Wesley Myers]

I'd imagine the western sets would be more popular in the USA than other parts of the world, its popular everywhere but surely its more interesting to the nation whose history its portraying? Theres even northern and southern soldiers.

One would think that -but the 'Myth of the West' seems to have been just as much of if not more so, attractive in Europe.  Look at all of the Western movies and books produced in Europe - not just today, but also during the historical time period (ie Karl May).

I think Wild West Playmobil sets are more popular in Europe than they are here. 

The Cowboy culture is still very predominant here (in Western Canada) and while all stores do sell Western items for kids (toy guns, etc) it is something that is prevalent and not something that people need to recreate artificially. 

The VAST majority if Wild West items aimed at children I have ever seen have been from Europe or the Orient. 

The greatest popularity here was in the 1950's and early 1960's inspired by television. 

The ideals of the Wild West are those that capture the imagination of all people - but it seems more so those who are removed from the reality of it.  While those who are immersed in the reality of it, often look elsewhere for their imaginations.