Category Archives: News

Celebrating LEGO fan creations on newly launched Rebrick.com

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Image credit: Mike Doyle

Mid-December saw the launch of a long-awaited new addition to how we at the LEGO Group collaborate with our amazing fan community. Rebrick.com is the name of a fantastic new site that aggregates all the wonderful LEGO fan creations in one place, making what is often hard to find visible to all and directing traffic back to all the places where amazing LEGO creations are posted.

The site’s raison d’être is to help bookmark all the creations made out of LEGO bricks, whether it is YouTube movies, LEGO models of Large Hadron colliders or classroom content. While we don’t often launch work in progress – the Rebrick.com site is in fact in Beta and what that means is we really want to hear your comments and suggestions to improving the site, just as much as we want to you to use it, populate it with the awesome things you find and create. The Rebrick site is our way of celebrating all the amazing creativity displayed by our fans and giving something back to all who love LEGO bricks and the system for what is.. something more than a toy – it is a creative medium!

LEGO® Minecraft reaches 10,000 votes on LEGO® Cuusoo open innovation platform

Some of you are already familiar with the LEGO® Cuusoo platform. Cuusoo is Japanese and stands for the words ‘I wish..’. It is also the name of the platform the LEGO Group use to invite the community of LEGO fans to suggest models the company should produce. Get 10,000 votes and we will explore putting your wish into production. The latest thing to hit Cuusoo are some excellent models suggested for LEGO® Minecraft, a game too many have got hooked to and which the creator describes as heavily inspired by his passion for all things LEGO. Check it out.

Consumer Driven: finding the right consumer-centered innovation methods

Tap into your community of innovators

Tap into your community of innovators

Over the past years I have been invited to speak at many conferences about consumer-centered innovation methods, and how we at the LEGO Group tap into our community of fans when developing new products. There is an increasing interest in this subject, as companies realise that it is often especially lead users who are significant innovators and are able to articulate opportunities and unmet needs better than many others. However, although recognising the value of these innovators, companies struggle to understand which approach to use when, and how to balance the opportunities highlighted by lead users with the needs of a broader audience of users.

This essay explains the thinking and methodology I have worked to define at the LEGO Group. It provides a framework for thinking about user-centered innovation and which consumer groups to involve when, as well as how to assess the company innovation portfolio to identify the areas where consumer driven or user-centered innovation can add the most value.

Originally I wrote this essay as part of my TRIUM EMBA program and have been told it will be featured as a case study on the executive marketing and business courses at HEC Paris. In the interest of moving the debate further on this subject I wanted to also share the essay here on my blog, and welcome your thoughts and reflections on this. I have licensed it under Creative Commons so you are welcome to use it for non-commercial purposes if you reference it and also share your writings. Looking forward to hearing from you.

Download it here:

Consumer Driven: The role of consumer affinity in selecting consumer-driven innovation methods

Creative Commons License
Consumer Driven: The role of Consumer Affinity in selecting Consumer-centered innovation methods at the LEGO Group. by Cecilia Weckström is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

You might also like the part II of this post – which delves into using technology to drive a realtime feedback loop for the truly consumer driven company

The Art of Brick LEGO® Exhibition (via theaustralien)

Some stunning LEGO creations here on show prove once again that only your imagination is the limit of what can be made with LEGO bricks. As a kid I had this dream that I wanted a swimming pool full of bricks so I could create some truly enormous models, (bigger than me!). This exhibition is one of those awe inspiring experiences that wake up the child within to dream and dream big and then go make something!

The Art of Brick LEGO® Exhibition They say when you dream, dream big. Well, that's exactly what the LEGO® exhibition has done. You see, everyone has some kind of connection with LEGO® bricks at some point in their lives. I remember when I was a little girl, I used to love playing with LEGO® bricks, building, creating, making; it kept me entertained for hours. So this exhibition is the mecca of dreaming big LEGO® dreams. Called The Art of Brick, the LEGO® exhibition features works … Read More

via theaustralien

Find laughter in every day

An odd thing happened to me yesterday. Ordinary as days can be, this was just another one of those, only difference was the taxi I got into. Happy Thursday! Said a smiling Sikh driver behind the wheel while I fumbled with my luggage and tried to sit down and not get the belt of my coat jammed in the door. Hi, I said and told him where I needed to go. Great, he said and started the engine, pulling out of the taxi rank.

You know, he said, staring at the traffic jam building up ahead of him, life is just too short to be miserable. I enthusiastically agreed and wondered where this conversation would take me. See, he continued, you have to find laughter in every day. If you don’t the world is just too much to deal with sometimes. This made me think that the recent bout of stress and work had made me forget this very simple but important point. I agreed with him again, and said that he must have come across some amazing stories from all the people he has been driving around in his years as a taxi driver.

He laughed and told me that he had indeed done some driving in his time, and that he was now over 70. This astonished me as he really didn’t look a day over fifty. Staggering I thought and rushed to tell him so, what’s your secret? I then asked. I walk three miles every day, I don’t eat junk food and I go to bed and get up the same time every day. Jealous, I told him I wish I could do the same. Too much travel, different time zones and crazy flights mean that I don’t think I very often go to bed at the same time at all, although I really do need my sleep and feel like a new person whenever I have managed to squeeze in eight hours or more. Don’t worry he said – if you worry about it, it will just be worse, he added. The important thing is to find laughter in every day. That is The simplest but biggest difference you can make for yourself and for others. When you smile the world smiles with you, when you laugh you kill the tension of the unspoken.