I've recently come out of my dark ages and back into collecting my favorite childhood toy, Legos. My favorites as a child were always castle, pirate, and city. Now as I get older I find my interest is primarily in castle and pirate and creating large scenes and landscapes related to those. Anyway that's my short into, now to the good stuff in this post, my review of the lego store in Troy, MI (I live in Grand Rapids, MI so Troy is the closest one).

Went today (9/6). I will rate the store 1-10 on 3 categories: staff, pick a brick wall, build a mini fig kiosk.

Staff: 9 - pleasant, helpful, one even went in back to see if they had any mini fig weapons as the kiosk was out. Patient and nice despite being busy on a Saturday.

Pick a brick wall: 7.5 - nice selection of bricks if you are interested in building landscapes or a fort or castle, light blue grey, dark blue grey, light tan, red brown, green bricks and plates. I bought up all the 1x1x4 light blue grey bricks (wish they had more). Would have liked to see more tiles selections.

Mini fig kiosk: 2 - terrible selection, almost all figs were construction workers or women, I bought all the pirate soldier torsos I could which was 5. No muskets, bought 1 cutlas, no additional hats, epaulettes, backpacks, or medieval weapons or armor or helmets. A few kingdoms lion knights torsos but no matching legs.

In comparison to the mini fig kiosk in northbrook mall (n chicago) this paled in comparison. I will post a review of northbrook soon.

Overall I give the Troy location a 6.33. This could be improved however if they improve the mini fig kiosk. I will email lego my to make them aware of this.

Hi welcome. I think an overall of 6.3 is very low for a shop that just happens to have a very bad mini fig kiosk at the moment. So in other words, if they improve that they will shoot up to an 8 or something? Seems very steep.

Good idea though to review LEGO stores, don't think I've seen that before. The community could rate stores over the world and thus show TLG what we really are looking for. From that point of view, it does make sense to penalise a store 'severely' if they don't live to expectations on a particular category. Especially since overall I suspect the stores in general are very good anyhow.

To be honest, the build a minifigure stand depends on what you're looking for. I tend to just go and see what's there, I don't ever have a plan- it's a bit random, which is half the fun. That being said, I've got some good hauls (for me) in the past at the stands, including ninjago and kingdoms lions, as well as a bunch of armour and great helms.

Although I'm nowhere near Troy, it's a cool idea to review stores!

Hi welcome. I think an overall of 6.3 is very low for a shop that just happens to have a very bad mini fig kiosk at the moment. So in other words, if they improve that they will shoot up to an 8 or something? Seems very steep.

Good idea though to review LEGO stores, don't think I've seen that before. The community could rate stores over the world and thus show TLG what we really are looking for. From that point of view, it does make sense to penalise a store 'severely' if they don't live to expectations on a particular category. Especially since overall I suspect the stores in general are very good anyhow.

Keep in mind I am only rating the stores I visit on the 3 categories that are variable. I assume all stores carry the same sets including exclusives from lego. Also, I can order any set I want from lego.com or another website so I personally don't go to the store (and drive 2 hours) for something I can probably find cheaper online. The staff, pick a brick, and mini fig bin are specifically unique to each store.

The reason I rated the minifig kiosk so low is because they literally had no weapons, armor, helmets, and the torsos and minifigs available we're so limited. Nearly all city comprised mostly of orange construction workers and women. I am comparing this to the other store I visited where I was very impressed with then minifig kiosk. So it's all about how it measures up to other store and the particular themes and bricks you seek.

I prefer castle and pirate and landscape type colored bricks so that's what I look for and why I posted this in the historic section.

Thanks for the feedback though, I hope it's helpful. I don't know how many I'll be able to visit as only a few are near me but i think this info might be helpful to others seeking to expand their collection thru lego store purchases and the unique offerings they have. I know I would have loved to have the option to build my own minifigs as a child and amass a large army that way.

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Edited September 7, 201410 yr by Off the wall

If you bought something, your receipt should have a web address to take the satisfaction survey. You can comment on your likes/dislikes. Usually the salesperson writes their name on the receipt too, so you can mention them if you want.

Every time I have submitted the survey, I have gotten an email back thanking me from that store's manager.

I've been to the troy store several times, and it sounds to me like you got caught at an off season. when I was there in June, the minifig kiosk was really diverse, I remember seeing knights, clowns, firefighters, and almost everything from the Lego Movie Collectable figs. the wall at the time was very "Friends" heavy though. your gauge on the employees was spot on, very helpful, and friendly.

This isn't really a review. It's more of a complaint based on a very limited time frame and a very narrow set of criteria.

Edited September 18, 201410 yr by Off the wall

Citizen - how is this not a review? Yes, I reviewed it based on my specific criteria and what I was looking for, and yes, I had some complaints, but overall I shared my experience at this store to inform others who might also be planning to visit.

That being said, I will likely return. I just hope the minifig kiosk contains more variety.