The hooded man darted previous shattered glass, his headlamp illuminating the uncommon collectibles housed in show circumstances that lined the partitions of Bricks & Minifigs in Whittier.
“Ninjago” Extremely Violet (Oni Masks of Hatred). Percival Graves (“Harry Potter” Collection 1). Velociraptor with Sand Inexperienced Again (“Jurassic World” Blue).
These sought-after Lego mini-figures have been amongst 600 or extra stolen on Could 3. In a predawn spree that lasted little greater than a minute, the thief stuffed a rubbish bag with about $10,000 price of collectible figurines earlier than sprinting to a ready automotive and rushing off.
The heist was one in every of six carried out at Bricks & Minifigs retailers throughout the Southland since April, a $100,000-plus crime spree that, on the heels of different related incidents, has rattled the rising — however cloistered — world of Lego collectors and retailers.
“Ten years in the past I simply couldn’t have imagined it — I didn’t assume our little pastime was the sort of factor that might appeal to that sort of crime,” stated Graham E. Hancock, editor of Blocks, an fanatic journal. “The concept that they’re making the most of actually devoted collectors and resellers … it’s simply scary for the pastime and for these companies.”
The COVID-19 pandemic turbocharged the Lego gathering pastime, with homebound collectors blitzing on-line resellers seeking coveted gadgets. That drove up costs, specialists stated, and attracted criminals.
Bricks & Minifigs, which has greater than 100 places nationwide, can carry beneficial Lego units and collectible figurines now not in manufacturing.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Occasions)
Bricks & Minifigs, a franchised chain with greater than 100 places nationwide, maintains a novel place within the Lego financial system. Not like official Lego shops, Bricks & Minifigs outposts carry beneficial units and collectible figurines now not in manufacturing. Some are bought of their unopened bins. Others are displayed in glass circumstances.
The roughly 1.5-inch collectible figurines — often called “minifigs” amongst hobbyists — can commerce for upward of $1,000 and are particularly attractive to thieves, stated Katie Leuschner, proprietor of the Whittier Boulevard retailer.
“You possibly can’t steal a Nineteen Sixties Mustang and conceal that,” she stated, “however you’ll be able to conceal a mini-figure and stockpile them for years, they usually’re solely going up in worth.”
A market matures
Lately, Lego encompasses a sprawling, multibillion-dollar ecosystem of toys, video video games, retail shops, tv reveals, movies, amusement parks and extra.
It’s simple to neglect the times when kids designed their very own spaceships and castles out of a stew of mismatched blocks spilled on the lounge shag.
Zane, 9, peruses Lego items on the Bricks & Minifigs store in Whittier, owned by mom Katie Leuschner.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Occasions)
Or that much more just lately, Lego Group, a Danish firm based in 1932, appeared in jeopardy.
In accordance with David C. Robertson, creator of the Lego historical past “Brick by Brick,” the corporate foundered within the late Nineties because it made ill-fated makes an attempt to enter the digital house. By 2003, he stated, issues have been dire for Lego, which launched its first “Automated Binding Brick” in 1949 and has since produced so many billions of items {that a} good portion of humanity has felt the ache of stepping on one barefoot.
“It’s actually laborious to overstate how shut they have been to chapter,” stated Robertson, noting that Lego Group had even mentioned an acquisition by rival Mattel. “They have been satisfied for some time that the choice was liquidation.”
However the firm course corrected by getting again to fundamentals — and understanding it wanted “to innovate across the brick,” he stated. That largely got here within the type of storytelling.
“They needed to create worlds and characters,” stated Robertson, a senior lecturer on the MIT Sloan College of Administration. “They needed to inform these tales with issues outdoors the field: comedian books, younger grownup fiction, motion pictures, apps and ties to different [companies’] mental property, like ‘Batman’ and ‘Star Wars.’”
Dow Jones knowledge present that Lego Group’s income was $9.65 billion in 2023, up about 74% from 5 years earlier.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Occasions)
It labored. To some Gen Xers’ disdain, kids have been now not content material constructing their very own creations out of the identical bucket of bricks. They wished new, evermore pricey kits — and the pastime grew to become far dearer.
The turnaround is obvious within the firm’s financials: Lego Group’s income in 2023 was $9.65 billion, up about 74% from 5 years earlier, in accordance with Dow Jones knowledge.
A number of the firm’s largest successes in recent times have been leisure choices tied to present mental property, such because the “Lego Batman Film,” which grossed $312 million worldwide, and Fox’s Emmy Award-nominated competitors TV present “Lego Masters.”
Lately, standard Lego units have centered on “Harry Potter,” “Jurassic World” and “Star Wars.” The primary “Star Wars” Legos got here out in 1999, and their success confirmed the corporate “the ability of story to generate gross sales,” Robertson stated. Curiosity in Legos tied to the house Western has solely grown: A number of the rarest and most costly “Star Wars” mini-figures are a light-up Darth Vader that sells for a whole bunch of {dollars} and a gold C-3PO that can promote for 1000’s of {dollars}.
Lego mini-figures — that are mostly discovered within the firm’s units and in thriller bins the place the customer doesn’t know what’s inside — have been reworked into full-fledged characters by means of their appearances in movies, TV reveals and different media. That has put them, and never the bricks, on the middle of the play ecosystem. “The mini-figures are the heroes, and let these taking part in with them be the hero,” stated Joe Evangelista, a author at Lego journal BrickJournal.
Eliza Garcia, 5, appears by means of Lego mini-figure heads at Bricks & Minifigs in Whittier.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Occasions)
At this time, Lego is the uncommon toy whose enchantment transcends childhood, and it maintains a robust base of devotees who’re often called “AFOLs,” or “grownup followers of Lego.” Armed with disposable earnings, AFOLs have turned gathering high-end units and mini-figures right into a booming on-line enterprise. Robertson, for instance, simply purchased a Lego mannequin of Notre-Dame Cathedral that clocks in at 4,383 items and prices $229.99. “Lego rebuilt it earlier than the French,” he joked.
Serving shoppers like Robertson are an array of internet sites and conventional media, equivalent to Blocks journal. Paging by means of a current concern, it’s clear how central gathering mini-figures is to the pastime. Challenge No. 114 included a canopy line referencing a celebrated figurine: “LEGO MEDIEVAL TOWN BRINGS BACK THE GOAT.”
It was an enormous deal.
“For 14 years, there was solely the one goat you may get,” Evangelista famous, including {that a} classic model of the goat went for upward of $100 throughout the pandemic.
However there are a lot of mini-figures buying and selling for rather more than that. In accordance with BrickEconomy.com, essentially the most beneficial mini-figure is a limited-edition Spider-Man model given out to attendees at Comedian-Con in 2013 that’s now price $5,500. The web site lists 16 different collectible figurines valued at greater than $1,000.
Robertson stated that prime costs have pushed a “large secondary marketplace for Legos,” with a number of on-line marketplaces for them, together with Lego-owned BrickLink. The shortage of some mini-figures has made them “an excellent funding,” he stated.
They’ve additionally change into a mainstay of a thriving black market.
The black marketplace for blocks
The previous few months have seen a string of Lego-related crimes throughout Southern California.
In April, days after the Bricks & Minifigs burglaries started, the California Freeway Patrol arrested 4 suspects after officers discovered them in possession of stolen Legos price $300,000. They’d allegedly taken units from retailers together with Goal and saved the products at stash homes in L.A. and Orange counties. Then, in early June, the Los Angeles Police Division introduced it’d damaged up one other alleged Lego theft ring, arresting two folks and seizing practically 3,000 bins of Legos saved at a property in Lengthy Seaside.
Authorities haven’t linked these crimes to the Bricks & Minifigs heists.
Pilfered gadgets are routinely provided on web gross sales platforms together with EBay and Fb Market, in accordance with Lego sellers and different specialists. That implies that hobbyists should depend on their very own judgment — and ethics — when conducting enterprise on-line.
Excessive costs have pushed a “large secondary marketplace for Legos,” an MIT lecturer says, including that the shortage of some mini-figures has made them “an excellent funding.”
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Occasions)
Veteran Lego supplier James Burrows stated crimson flags embody sellers who “have an incredible quantity of one thing and they aren’t a collector.”
Burrows stated that BrickLink, which boasts greater than 18,000 sellers, together with practically 6,000 within the U.S., is a safer place to purchase and promote than the mainstream on-line marketplaces. The location provides members the power to report regarding habits or exercise to the web site’s directors.
Lego Group, in fact, is conscious of the illicit sale of its toys. An organization spokesperson directed The Occasions to an internet useful resource that outlines how shoppers can spot faux on-line Lego shops, amongst different points.
Monitoring down stolen Legos on-line is a tall order. Shauna Garcia, proprietor of the Bricks & Minifigs Ontario retailer, which misplaced about 500 mini-figures price practically $7,000 in an April heist, stated that she’s been in search of her gadgets on Fb Market however hasn’t noticed any. “They’re not being bought there in an excellent apparent approach,” she stated. “I’m protecting an eye fixed out for heaps and plenty of minis.”
Weeks after her retailer was burgled, Leuschner had an odd interplay with a person providing her 1000’s of Legos “at a really low worth.” The would-be vendor, she stated, was Richard Siegel, one of many individuals who, in accordance with police, allegedly operated the theft ring that saved greater than 2,800 ill-gotten Legos in Lengthy Seaside.
Reached by phone, Siegel, 71, advised The Occasions that he “for positive” wasn’t responsible, declining to remark additional.
Burrows, who is predicated in Florida, stated that he routinely offers with suspect sellers on the Brick College, his brick-and-mortar retailer.
Weeks after her Whitter retailer was burgled, Katie Leuschner had an odd interplay with a person providing her 1000’s of Legos “at a really low worth.”
(Katie Leuschner)
“Individuals will present up, and it’s the often the identical story: ‘Oh , my boss closed their comedian retailer and paid me with Legos,’” he stated. “Or, ‘My child received extras of those [for a] birthday.’”
Burrows spoke to The Occasions whereas en path to Brickworld, a Lego fan conference held in Chicago final weekend. He stated that gadgets stolen in L.A. might have wound up on the expo and been bought to unsuspecting attendees.
“They might simply be unloaded,” he stated. Distributors “may have all these high-end figures, they usually will provide you with story and a tremendous deal.”
Opening amid against the law wave
By the point Rob and Betty Poquez opened their Bricks & Minifigs franchise in Pasadena on Could 4, three of their sister shops had been burgled. That prompted the Poquezes to make some modifications.
The crime “knowledgeable loads of the decision-making for our retailer,” Rob Poquez stated.
He stated that they reconsidered the whole lot, together with their end-of-day procedures and the way the house could be staged. Priceless “Star Wars” units and mini-figures are housed in a glass case on the rear of the shop. It just lately displayed a Republic Cruiser with mini-figures (worth: $350) and a Republic Gunship with mini-figures ($600).
Three burglaries prompted retailer house owners Betty and Rob Poquez to vary procedures at their Bricks & Minifigs outposts.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Occasions)
The Poquezes are additionally cautious of individuals attempting to promote them stolen items. Up to now, they’ve not had a transaction that “felt uncomfortable,” Rob Poquez stated. “We get loads of children with households.” And, owing to a rule set by Lego, Bricks & Minifigs operators usually are not allowed to purchase new, currently-in-production units from shoppers, Betty Poquez stated, which “helps us keep away from stolen items.”
On a current afternoon, a preteen boy stood in entrance of a big bulk bin on the middle of the couple’s retailer and surveyed his choices. The Legos plinked as he sifted by means of mounds of blocks underneath the gaze of no less than 5 wall-mounted safety cameras.
A small container on the fringe of the bin was labeled “WALL OF SHAME” — this was the place prospects put any non-Lego items discovered throughout their rummaging. An indication defined the majority pricing, beginning at $8 to fill a small tub.
This model of the pastime appeared far faraway from the world of AFOLs and $1,000 mini-figures — and the kind of crime that had been visited upon the opposite native branches of Bricks & Minifigs.
The boy’s father leaned in to elucidate how the majority bin let him get a bunch of Legos on a budget.
“This,” he advised his son, “is a chance.”
