Originally published in print in April 2026. View print issues here.

Brick by brick, LEGO® prices have been steadily rising. Founded in 1932, the company produces a variety of playable sets that many people enjoy collecting. However, with increasing costs, fewer students purchase LEGO sets.
LEGO sets have always been a significant part of junior Avery Pratt’s life since she began playing with them alongside her sisters as a child. Recently, it has grown into a collectible hobby.

“My mom would always get me and my sisters the LEGO Friends, and we would make LEGO City in our living room,” Pratt said. “I’ve always collected LEGO then, but now it’s less LEGO Friends and more of the botanical ones.”

Similarly, junior Jack Earl has collected many playable sets growing up. Earl mentions how his dad had big LEGO bins, allowing him to be creative and build a variety of things. However, Earl’s passion for LEGO sets has declined over the years.

“It’s definitely [a] thing that happened in my childhood more,” Earl said. “It’s happened less now since I need to get more money because they’ve gotten really expensive.”

Senior Tim Menard mainly collects LEGO because of his love for Ninjago. Compared to his childhood, Menard focuses more on detailed sets intended for display rather than playing.

“I try to look for mainly how good of a value it is. A lot of LEGO sets can get expensive. A lot of the big sets I really like for the details,” Menard said. “I look at how big and how detailed it is if it is worth the price.”

According to Pattern, a global e-commerce acceleration platform, the LEGO company announced its prices would be increasing by up to 25% in 2022, and “average prices among the top LEGO sets only increased by 4.7% year over year” when comparing 2022 to 2021. As a result, certain LEGO sets reached hundreds of dollars, including the Titanic selling at $680, Star Wars’ Millennium Falcon at $850 and Death Star at $1000.

Brickify, a retail store dedicated to buying, selling and trading pre-owned and new LEGO sets, explains that the LEGO brand is facing rising costs due to changes in price of the plastic brick material and shipping containers. The website states that the company will continue to increase its prices in line with inflation and higher production costs.

In addition to adjusting to the costs of inflation, the LEGO company also has to pay license fees, which contribute to the high price. For example, the Home Alone house, Vincent Van Gogh’s Starry Night, Disney Pixar Luxo Jr. and many more sets require licenses, according to Brickset. These sets range from $70 to $300. Reflecting on a time when she and her friend wanted to gift each other LEGO sets, Pratt expressed how the price increases have affected her.

“We were going to do a LEGO swap, but our limit was $20,” Pratt said. “We couldn’t get any LEGO sets besides the mini ones because everything was too expensive, and all the good LEGO sets are $100.”

While Pratt understands inflation’s impact on pricing, she still believes certain LEGO sets are too expensive for the average consumer.

“What about the families who can’t afford LEGO sets? What if that’s a core part of a kid’s childhood or something they really want, but they can’t afford it?” Pratt said. “The smaller LEGO sets should definitely [cost] less, but I understand that inflation is real, and the store just wants to make more money.”

Earl doesn’t think the newer, higher prices match the quality or size of a set.

“It’s just plastic. I’ve seen a few pounds of plastic worth like $1,000. It’s crazy,” Earl said. “I remember a few years ago, they looked like they fit the pricing, but now, they don’t.”

Still, not everyone is deterred from purchasing LEGO sets because of the high prices.

“I have a job and the money. I can save up and get these bigger sets,” Menard said. “But for a lot of people, it becomes a lot harder to get.”

For Earl, buying LEGO sets reminds him of the nostalgia from his childhood. Pratt suggests that admiring the set during the building process is another reason some teens buy LEGO sets.

“When I build LEGO sets and they take a long time, I like looking at it for a while [and] knowing that I accomplished that instead of putting it in a drawer,” Pratt said.

Over the years, the LEGO company has shifted its marketing and rebranded itself towards an older demographic. Earl believes that the company’s near-bankruptcy in 2003, which resulted in a loss of roughly $1 million per day, is what led them to alter their marketing.

The Strategy Institute, a platform dedicated to advancing business strategy, states that there were multiple factors that led to the company’s near-bankruptcy. When the LEGO brand shifted its focus away from creativity and uniqueness to trends — such as video games, merchandise and TV shows — it stretched itself thin and began to lose value. To create trendy sets, the company had to produce thousands of unique building blocks, making manufacturing costly without bringing in the same revenue. The company then started to lose touch with its customers because sets were complex and lengthy when they wanted “creativity and imaginative play.”

However, when the LEGO brand shifted to an older demographic and returned to its roots with sets that encouraged creativity, its sales started growing again. By targeting builds that appeal to adults, such as architectural and decorative builds, it redefined itself.

“When I see that they’re releasing quality sets that are high quality and high detail, and not [at a] horrible price, that’s what really makes you want to keep supporting the company,” Menard said.

Photo courtesy of DashBrick