Twenty Formula One drivers climbed into what looked like parade props at the Miami Grand Prix. Then the Lego cars pulled away and lapped the circuit. There were ten of them, built from nearly 400,000 bricks each. Lego says the stunt drew something like two or three billion views. It's the toy maker's whole strategy in one picture.
Saabira Chaudhuri interviewed Julia Goldin, Lego's chief product and marketing officer, for the Journal's C-Suite Strategies report. Lego is Danish, privately held and the world's largest toy maker. Its first-half revenue rose 21% to a record 41.9 billion Danish kroner ($6.27 billion). Net profit climbed 32% to 8.6 billion kroner. Its core buyer used to be a young boy. Now it sells to adults, girls and teens, and it got there by changing the question it asks.
Goldin says Lego stopped asking who a customer is and started asking what they love. Bonsai trees. Golden retrievers. Olivia Rodrigo. Formula One. A Gustav Klimt painting for the wall. A Game Boy for anyone who misses the '80s or '90s. The first flower bouquet came out in 2021 for buyers 18 and up. Lego says it completely underestimated the demand. Teen girls wanted the flowers too, so the age range came down.
Bonsai for the boys, race cars for the girls
The surprises run both ways. Bonsai trees are a top 10 product for men and teen boys. Speed Champions F1 cars make the top 10 for teen girls. Goldin's 16-year-old son asked for two Olivia Rodrigo sets because his friends love her. "That's why we don't market to a demographic," she says. Lego won't share sales from these campaigns, only that those sets are some of its most successful. Her explanation for why grown-ups build at all is screen fatigue. Three hours go by scrolling reels, and people want to make something they can point to. They want to say, "Wow, I did this."
Our read
Our read falls under Cash Flow (M5), with a side of business sense. Lego is private, so there's no ticker to buy, and none of our model books holds a toy maker named here. The business lesson is for anyone who sells anything. Lego says selling to interests instead of age groups helped push first-half revenue up 21%. A dentist, a tutor or a landscaper can borrow that question. The household lesson is quieter. Adults are paying real money for a few hours away from the phone, and Lego says builders come away proud of what they made. That's a fair trade when it's planned.
So here's the check for your own plan. Hobby spending is the line most budgets never write down, and it's the one that grows when you're tired. Open your card statement this week and add up the sets, kits and gear from the last three months. Put that number in your monthly spending plan as its own line. A hobby you've budgeted is a joy. One you haven't is a surprise in December. We'd rather you find the umbrella while the sky is still clear, and a quick pass over your spending lines is where that starts.