Brick Train Awards Prizes

[LegoTrainDude9231]

I don't want to be ungrateful but the prize difference between the Americas and Europe- etc is severe.

Europe gets a $65 double crossover for regionals and an $85 triple crossover for global prizes. 

But why the US gets a $40 switch pack for regionals and IF you land in 5 out of 10 categories you get a $25 gift card for Brick Train Depot.  Also, there is nothing you can buy at BTD for $25.

And if you don't fit in the 5 categories then you get nothing other than a 2X8 and if you do fit in those 5 categories you get a $15 FRED and if there are more than 2 US winners well then there aren't enough FRED's.

 

Europe total prize value:  $150       - more than 1 and 1/4 loop of BT r104 track

US total prize value: $40 or $75     - a bit more than 1/2 a loop of BT r104 track

 

How is this fair, how does the US get botched like this? For ocTRAINtober, the highest prize was $329 and the lowest was $40.   

I cost BT $20 to produce a loop of track can they give away a loop of r120 for each global winner or is that too hard.  

 

I was expecting a loop of r56 for regionals or a switch pack and a loop of r120/104 for globals, not a switch pack, and maybe a $25 gift card for regionals and either NOTHING or a $15 FRED. 

 

BTW BT hasn't even listed r104 switches on their website. 

 

What do you think?

Edited June 24, 2020 by LegoTrainDude9231

[1974]

What the funk are you talking about?

[JopieK]

I have not

40 minutes ago, 1974 said:

What the funk are you talking about?

I don't have the faintest idea as well ;)

[BrickMusher]

Don't know what the question is, but the answer is 42

 

[Mr Hobbles]

I believe he’s on about this, and generally complaining about their prizes: https://www.bricktrainawards.com/

I haven’t seen it mentioned anywhere other than a casual post on Brickset a couple of weeks ago.

[UrbanErwin]

I don't want to be that guy, but (the best stuff is always behind this word) be glad there are prices, or a custom printed brick for that matter, at all. These companies don't have to hand out anything, they do it because they want to (and it gives some good press).

Tl;Dr: Don't look a given horse in the mouth

For the hosts of the contest, I'm really glad you put in all the time and effort!

[supertruper1988]

2 hours ago, LegoTrainDude9231 said:

Also, there is nothing you can buy at BTD for $25.

There is plenty you can buy on BTD for $25. We have lots of instructions at or under that price. 

[Roadmonkeytj]

47 minutes ago, supertruper1988 said:

There is plenty you can buy on BTD for $25. We have lots of instructions at or under that price. 

There are several listings for $10 so you even buy three and only be $5 out of pocket? 

As far as the prizes I believe they are trying to source "local" prizes as international shipping can be delayed 2 months right now.

[Coal Fired Bricks]

Conner why did you have to post this.  BT, Trix, and BTD have done a lot of hard work, and yes you have seen my work for NEBW where even task 11 is only $0.45 a section of track(but molds cost $3 so I need to get the cost way down) but 3d printing is not that cheap and even though bulk ABS is less expensive than potting soil you have to know how much Scot has put a ton of time, effort and money to get this idea off the ground.  Yes, Europe may have more $$$ in prizes but at least US companies are giving away valuable products during a time where they may not have a ton of revenue.  These companies are giving away their paycheck when they don't have much of it when they most need it.  I'm sorry what you are building is not in one of the 5 categories that get the $25 and FRED that is life. 

 

-Coal Fired Bricks 

[BricksMcgee]

7 hours ago, LegoTrainDude9231 said:

I don't want to be ungrateful but the prize difference between the Americas and Europe- etc is severe.

Europe gets a $65 double crossover for regionals and an $85 triple crossover for global prizes. 

But why the US gets a $40 switch pack for regionals and IF you land in 5 out of 10 categories you get a $25 gift card for Brick Train Depot.  Also, there is nothing you can buy at BTD for $25.

And if you don't fit in the 5 categories then you get nothing other than a 2X8 and if you do fit in those 5 categories you get a $15 FRED and if there are more than 2 US winners well then there aren't enough FRED's.

 

Europe total prize value:  $150       - more than 1 and 1/4 loop of BT r104 track

US total prize value: $40 or $75     - a bit more than 1/2 a loop of BT r104 track

 

How is this fair, how does the US get botched like this? For ocTRAINtober, the highest prize was $329 and the lowest was $40.   

I cost BT $20 to produce a loop of track can they give away a loop of r120 for each global winner or is that too hard.  

 

I was expecting a loop of r56 for regionals or a switch pack and a loop of r120/104 for globals, not a switch pack, and maybe a $25 gift card for regionals and either NOTHING or a $15 FRED. 

 

BTW BT hasn't even listed r104 switches on their website. 

 

What do you think?

HI all,

I'm one of the organisers of the events.

As others have said, we've been lucky to get these prizes, and there is a bit of discrepancy in prize values, which we decided was OK - the "prizes" themselves are a nice bonus on what is a chance to see a lot of LEGO railway / railroad models from around the world. If you're participating just for the prizes, you're probably missing the wider point of the event.

Americas just happen to have more, possibly smaller LEGO-compatible businesses who wanted to get involved - TrixBrix have been very generous in covering the remaining regions this year, and it's not just the prize value - it's also the value of shipping which needs to be covered.

Hope that clears things up!

Richard

5 hours ago, UrbanErwin said:

I don't want to be that guy, but (the best stuff is always behind this word) be glad there are prices, or a custom printed brick for that matter, at all. These companies don't have to hand out anything, they do it because they want to (and it gives some good press).

Tl;Dr: Don't look a given horse in the mouth

For the hosts of the contest, I'm really glad you put in all the time and effort!

Thanks. It's been more work so far than we thought it would be, but nice to see the largely positive response from the community so far.

Edited June 24, 2020 by BricksMcgee

[Coal Fired Bricks]

@BricksMcgee I have a question about the BTA.  If you build 10 wide(1:38ish) would that fall under the standard loco/rolling stock category or in the other category? This doesn't apply to me because I build 8-wide and I'm 18 so I will be participating in the TFOL category but this was on my mind. 

[BricksMcgee]

10 minutes ago, Coal Fired Bricks said:

@BricksMcgee I have a question about the BTA.  If you build 10 wide(1:38ish) would that fall under the standard loco/rolling stock category or in the other category? This doesn't apply to me because I build 8-wide and I'm 18 so I will be participating in the TFOL category but this was on my mind. 

If it runs on standard LEGO tracks, it can go in the generic loco / rolling stock categories.

If we decide to run again next year, I think we'd try and add a few TFOL categories (wagon, loco, structure) as it's been one of the more popular categories and we're seeing quite a wide range of models: going to be a hard one to judge!

[jrathfon]

"I don't want to be ungrateful but"... [ungrateful statement to follow!].

@BricksMcgee Thanks for all of the hard work and keeping the hobby alive! I'm not participating, but I sure will check out all the buzz and winners!

I love to lurk and be inspired and am super excited about all the progress our niche hobby (lego TRAINS, specifically) is getting these past few years! New vendors, new custom track, new official sets, BMR, BTD. Love the community! My HO train club father loves to show off all the realistic modelling we're doing on the Lego side! Keep up the good work! Didn't know that the FRED existed by BTD, but awesome it's a prize! Just moved, but when I get my layout back up that's first on the list to purchase!

[BricksMcgee]

22 minutes ago, jrathfon said:

"I don't want to be ungrateful but"... [ungrateful statement to follow!].

@BricksMcgee Thanks for all of the hard work and keeping the hobby alive! I'm not participating, but I sure will check out all the buzz and winners!

I love to lurk and be inspired and am super excited about all the progress our niche hobby (lego TRAINS, specifically) is getting these past few years! New vendors, new custom track, new official sets, BMR, BTD. Love the community! My HO train club father loves to show off all the realistic modelling we're doing on the Lego side! Keep up the good work! Didn't know that the FRED existed by BTD, but awesome it's a prize! Just moved, but when I get my layout back up that's first on the list to purchase!

Thanks! I think the imbalance in prizes is a relevant thing we can look at next year (if we've recovered by then to run something again!), but it really depends on what the sponsors are willing to offer. As I said above, TrixBrix have been awesome on the European side, helping us out with shipping of other prizes too - not a cheap thing to do for 10 winners in Asia and Australasia each.

We're not making a profit from the event, just covering costs (in fact, our LNUR train club is funding the winners' brick prints from our membership subs for Europe and Asia) - we initially discussed a small entry fee for the awards (e.g., $1) to help cover prizes, but our aim was to keep it free to be as inclusive as possible.

I'm really enjoying seeing the entries: I'm blown away by some of them (which we're sharing some of over on the Brick Train Awards Facebook page), and it's amazing that so many of these builders seem to build in isolation from the community.

Definitely agree on vendors - lots of great stuff out there these days to push LEGO models closer to model railways. We did a model railway show last year - my first in some time - and had lots of nice feedback from traditional model railway builders on how far LEGO can be dragged in to making decent loco / rolling stock models. And, of course, the inevitable few rivet counters who were enjoying a loco until they realised it was LEGO and not O Gauge :P

It's been quite a while since I've posted on EB, so it's nice to be back, anyway!

[UrbanErwin]

1 hour ago, BricksMcgee said:

We're not making a profit from the event, just covering costs (in fact, our LNUR train club is funding the winners' brick prints from our membership subs for Europe and Asia) - we initially discussed a small entry fee for the awards (e.g., $1) to help cover prizes, but our aim was to keep it free to be as inclusive as possible. 

Is there a way to make a small financial donation? I wouldn't mind chipping in a few Euro's. I love the feed with entries on FB and it is doing a lot to motivate me to push some extra models to the finish line just a little faster.

[BricksMcgee]

6 minutes ago, UrbanErwin said:

Is there a way to make a small financial donation? I wouldn't mind chipping in a few Euro's. I love the feed with entries on FB and it is doing a lot to motivate me to push some extra models to the finish line just a little faster.

That’s really kind, but we don’t really have a mechanism for that at the moment!

Me too - so many brilliant models. I don’t think we’ll get to post them all, something we’ll have to work out a solution for if we want to run it again. 

[Hod Carrier]

I'm very grateful to all the guys behind these awards for all their amazing hard work and to the sponsors for their generosity. I don't imagine that any of them are making heaps of cash from what is a fairly small hobby community, so these donations no doubt represent a real investment in the goodwill of the LEGO trains community as a whole.

To me the prizes really don't enter into my thinking because they aren't my motivation to take part. I just love to see what everyone else is up to and enjoy all the fabulous builds that a contest like this is bound to attract, and it's always good to see how your own builds match up against those from other well-respected designers. For the last three years it's been OcTRAINber (will that still be going ahead or will this replace it?), but this has the potential for being an even bigger stage for the community to show off the skills and imagination that we have. I'm really looking forward to this with huge anticipation.

[BricksMcgee]

3 minutes ago, Hod Carrier said:

I'm very grateful to all the guys behind these awards for all their amazing hard work and to the sponsors for their generosity. I don't imagine that any of them are making heaps of cash from what is a fairly small hobby community, so these donations no doubt represent a real investment in the goodwill of the LEGO trains community as a whole.

To me the prizes really don't enter into my thinking because they aren't my motivation to take part. I just love to see what everyone else is up to and enjoy all the fabulous builds that a contest like this is bound to attract, and it's always good to see how your own builds match up against those from other well-respected designers. For the last three years it's been OcTRAINber (will that still be going ahead or will this replace it?), but this has the potential for being an even bigger stage for the community to show off the skills and imagination that we have. I'm really looking forward to this with huge anticipation.

Thank you. It’s been a pleasure to see so many models, and interact with many members of the LEGO train community I haven’t met yet, too. 
 

OcTRAINber is still going ahead - this won’t replace it - BMR guys put a lot of effort in to that too!

[Duq]

You might want to start a new topic and properly announce this competition, then ask mods to close this one.

Starting the thread with some rambling complaint is not great advertising....

 

Having said that, I'd better but the laptop away and finish that new steam loco I've been tinkering with during lockdown ;-)

[BricksMcgee]

12 minutes ago, Duq said:

You might want to start a new topic and properly announce this competition, then ask mods to close this one.

Starting the thread with some rambling complaint is not great advertising....

 

Having said that, I'd better but the laptop away and finish that new steam loco I've been tinkering with during lockdown ;-)

Good point! EB missed our initial sweep of places LEGO train fans hang out, so should correct that  

I’ll post something in the next day or so. 

[legoman666]

Nothing is stopping you from starting a lego train company and giving away a $200 prize. You do sound ungrateful.

Edited June 26, 2020 by legoman666