Over the past couple of months we've been working closely with Norton&Co in the UK and D2C in Münich to arrange a special pre-opening event at the Leicester Square LEGO Brand Retail Store in London.
The store officially opened on November 17th at 12 o'clock, so being able to invite and run a pre-opening event requires some planning and handshakes to happen. But since it was something that everyone wanted, it wasn't difficult at all - it only took some planning to get an idea of who to invite and how to get everyone to sign the Declaration of Secrecy.
Working with the Recognized LEGO Fan Media and Recognized LEGO User Groups invited has been amazing and smooth. You should be proud of your ambassadors and the time and effort they put into distributing the scarce amount of tickets that were made available to them.
I know it is not easy when you have 50 AFOLs that want to come but only 5 tickets. Someone is bound to be disappointed and I am truly sorry that we couldn't invite everyone - but there is a limit to the store size and the number of invites possible while still keeping the event intimate and special.
So "hat's off" to the ambassadors for agreeing to that responsibility and having those difficult discussions with their members.
When the store opened the doors and the let AFOLs in (some of them had been waiting in line for quite a while by then), everyone got a big applause as they entered the store - which was a pretty fun gesture and nice way to welcome the AFOLs into the store.
Once everyone was in, Glenn Abell, Vice President D2C (direct to consumer) EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) gave a warm welcome to the community, followed by a welcome by me and then a quick mention of the day's offers - should anyone want to make a purchase.
The new LEGO Architecture set, the 21304 London Skyline was available at the store ahead of it's global launch January 1st. Buying one would also land the opportunity to get it signed by the designer Rok and also present was LEGO Architecture's design manager Jamie Berard.
Thank you to all the super cool AFOLs that came and made the day a blast. You took the day (or days) off to come and celebrate with us and that did not go unnoticed. You're awesome and all the LEGO employees agreed that you were The Best.
You all kept the embargo and that is quite an achievement given the amount of pictures taken and video shot inside the store - thank you! And Thank You for sharing everything as soon as you were allowed to. My Facebook notification counter has been busy since the store opened with all the fantastic pictures you took.
Congratulations to those of you that won the Lester minifig and/or the Mosaic Maker set. I didn't, but I still won the best prize of all which was to spend a couple of hours with you in the Leicester Square LEGO Brand Retail Store the day before it officially opened.
I really enjoyed myself and I am certain you did too. I've already mentioned that we're ready the next time they want to create a special AFOL pre-opening event anywhere in the world!
The participating RLUGs and RLFMs were:
Blocks Magazine
Brick Fanatics
Brick.Ie
Bricks / Bricks Culture
Brickshire
Eurobricks
Fairy Bricks
Jedinews UK
London AFOLs
The New Elementary
Northern Brickworkd
Promobricks
SLTC
The Brickish Association
The Brothers Brick
The Tartan LUG
Others: Mark Campbell, Bright Bricks, Warren and Teresa Elsmore (who were also there for the DFDS ship being on Trafalgar Square on the same day as the opening - what an opportunity! To see the new LEGO store and the world's biggest LEGO ship).
Edited by Kim Thomsen | LEGO
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