[quote name='bostonqt']Had a largely fruitless shopping trip to TRU in Framingham -- Lego shelves were half empty, and there were about 8 shoppers with lists in the Lego aisle looking to spend spend spend. Most of them didn't even have the 25% off coupons, just handwritten lists from their children of what they wanted. If I were the manager, I'd be pulling my hair out over the missed sales due to understocking. The staff was busy but quite helpful about checking on availability -- I was hoping to score a Tower Bridge, a NASA Shuttle and a City Airport with the coupon, but none in stock. No Count Dooku either -- I'd say the selection was about 1/3 of the non-holiday norm. Also ran into another shopper with a cheat sheet for the series 3, which I didn't bother buying -- there were about 10 packs in 2 boxes left. I did buy a Police Mobile Unit and a polybag Speeder (to get over $50), and picked another Speeder as my freebie minifig. At least I found some heavily-discounted Nerf Wii game bundles by the checkout.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='bigdaddy']It's not under stocking, it's just really bad management! LEGO has been a huge seller the last few years and TRU as a company should have been buying more. They keep having BOGO50% off sales but never buy more sets.
However why don't those people just go to The LEGO Store? The sets are probably cheaper.[/QUOTE]
[quote name='bostonqt']Gotta agree, it's bad management. One of the sales guys told me that the Lego guy came in yesterday but they're still not stocked. I feel bad for the sales people who really want to help and sell stuff, but just don;t have the stock to sell.
I guess these customers aren't going to the Lego store (or Amazon) because Lego is only half the Xmas list and it's easier to get everything in one stop, rather than drive over to the Natick Mall, find another parking space, walk through half the mall, etc etc. Seriously, half the would-be customers in the TRU Lego aisle were Grandma & Grandpa clutching the list that Grandsonny wrote up for them, bless their hearts. I gave my unused coupon to a sweet bewildered 70yo+ couple and told them to put down the lame police boat and buy their 10-yo the mobile police unit instead.[/QUOTE]
It is about proper management. At my store, Lego is restocked first every night before anything else along with a couple other key areas. Lego will sell even without any coupons or B1G1 sales. There are some stores that don't comprehend that concept. I've seen the sales numbers for my area, and they are so much larger than last year in every single store. If stores choose not to capitalize on the sales they could have had, it's their loss.
When our Lego rep comes in, he kinda gets disappointed since there really isn't much for him to do since everything pretty much gets worked out beforehand.