I just noticed this while browsing the LEGO S@H US site.

Has anyone attended this in previous years (apparently they have been going for 5 years or so, according to the video)?

The price (~US$2000) is a little steep, but I guess they want to make it really exclusive, and only for the die-hard fans. I'm stuck in Australia, so can't really pony up the airfare let alone the entry fee, but surely someone from 'Eurobricks' is going/has gone?

I'll be in Balkan Europe for a few weeks next year with the intention of spending the remainder of my time in Europe taking part in this experience.

I'll be happy to stump up the cash for it.

I haven't taken the tour myself but in Jonathan Bender's book "LEGO: A Love Story" he takes the tour. You get to see the factory where they make the bricks, you get a set that is truly unique for this tour (last year it was a model of Ole Kirk Christiansen's house) and finally, and best of all, you get to go into their "secret" vault where they keep a MISB copy of almost every set released.

I went this year (May 2010), it was a great trip, although it was very expensive. The designers were very helpful and interesting to talk to and the tour of the factory was very interesting and made you realise why lego is so expensive.

I seem to remember someone saying that you get to go into their element room and take a handful of one-of-a-kind parts.

This is kind of a Willy Wonka-esque experience. Big drawback is that you have to pay for it, which I'd be happy to do. Sounds awesome. I want a golden ticket....Or in this case, brick!

I went this year (May 2010), it was a great trip, although it was very expensive. The designers were very helpful and interesting to talk to and the tour of the factory was very interesting and made you realise why lego is so expensive.

Did you get "gifts" (after all, it's not a gift if you have to pay 2000 USD to buy it )

But it's really expensive.

I seem to remember someone saying that you get to go into their element room and take a handful of one-of-a-kind parts.

Yeah, I've heard this too. A guy and his son in our LUG went on this tour and came back with a bunch of certain rare elements. I think they were allowed 20-50 elements each or something like that.

This sounds interesting, but the price is way too high. I would much rather buy $2000 worth of actual Lego sets.

i went on the tour, you were allowed 40 elements, in total, but you could select from any part, i ordered all the parts to make the new general grevious and some of the minfig accessories from series 2, and some head and helmets I did not recognise (they were prototypes)however, they are not shipping them until the end of september as some were not in production yet.

Edited September 4, 201014 yr by Keith Turner

I went this year (May 2010), it was a great trip, although it was very expensive. The designers were very helpful and interesting to talk to and the tour of the factory was very interesting and made you realise why lego is so expensive.

Kieth Turner,

How about a full review/more details of the tour? I'm sure the 99% of people who won't be able to/ can't go (including me ) would very much appreciate it! Or did they make you sign a confidentiality form?

$2000US doesn't seem that hard to save up for. A pilgrimage trip for the devout Lego Fan to make at least once in a life time?

You had to sign a non disclosure agreement before the tour started, so I cant tell you much more than the itinary they have on their web site. However, being a lego nut, I thought it was worth the cost, and it was a once in a life time experience. The main plus side is you get an exclusive set designed just for the people on the tour, nothing special apart from its is limited to 32 sets (you had to agree not to sell it as well). The highlughts of the tour were.

1 - meeting the designers and seeing how the whole design phase develops from an idea to a range of sets, they discussed the atlantis theme, which was 2 years from the idea to the first set hitting the shelves (they were already working on 2012 sets when we were there, but we were only allowed to see the rest of the 2010 sets.

2 - having a tour of their factory, which was very impressive.

3 - meeting the boss and ceo

4 - seeing the archive vaults (you were not allowed to touch)

The bits I was not bothered about was the tour behind the scenes of the lego park in billund, although meeting the designers who build the models was interesting.

Edited September 8, 201014 yr by Keith Turner

Wow, that sounds great ! I imagine you more than made your monies worth spending that much on discounted sets!!

Wonder why they were shocked at how much you spent, i would imagine the people taking these tours have that kind of disposable income to spend, and would take full advantage of the discount.

I would like to take the tour at some stage, but i dont think im in the situation to be able to do it at the moment! Definitely one day though, it can be my Mecca

EDIT by admin: Removed quote on request since Keith edited his post. Hope what was OK

That sound brilliant. Got a picture of all the sets you bought?

I would like to go one day myself...

EDIT by admin: Removed quote on request since Keith edited his post. Hope what was OK

That sound brilliant. Got a picture of all the sets you bought?

I would like to go one day myself...

No photos, all part of my huge MISB collection

Wow, that sounds great ! I imagine you more than made your monies worth spending that much on discounted sets!!

Wonder why they were shocked at how much you spent, i would imagine the people taking these tours have that kind of disposable income to spend, and would take full advantage of the discount.

I would like to take the tour at some stage, but i dont think im in the situation to be able to do it at the moment! Definitely one day though, it can be my Mecca

Luckily I am fairly old (48) so do have a large disposable income to spend on lego, to make up for the fact that as a kid I never had any lego. I did have lego when my kids were yooung, but came out of my dark ages 2 years agao when i got there stuff out for my grand daughter, I must confess since being back into lego my disposable income is a lot less :-)

WOW nice to read this.

i allready send a email to the "responsable" persson to ask a few questions, if my questions have "positive" answers, to next yesr i took this tour :grin:

Indeed it sounds like a version of Charly and the Chocolate factory. I hope they continue doing this tour for quite some time as I don't have the money to do such a thing yet. We'll see. It's definitively something special and I must say I enjoyed looking at the pics and video! Best, K.