Recently, LEGO released a new product line called LEGO Friends geared directly at girls. A bit like LEGO meets Barbie, these pink-themed blocks centre around five girlfriends who each have their own unique space to create: a cafe, a veterinary clinic, a beauty shop, a convertible, and a flowery tree house. Other accessories follow the girls and match their personal interests. There are also online activities designed to let girls discover more about their new LEGO BFFs.
There’s been some debate in the office over this new development. Some of the SavvyMoms really like this new addition to the LEGO world—seeing as the present LEGO world is very male-centric, they feel that LEGO Friends will allow for the girls in their house (or those coming over to play) to get more excited about building. It has a reminiscent feeling of Barbie, Polly Pocket and other new product line extensions like Crayola’s Pop Art Pixies.
Others think that it’s trying too hard to really pigeonhole kids and it’s already received some criticism for this exact issue. Some SavvyMom HQ moms feel that girls, who understandably may not be excited about the challenge of the LEGO Millennium Falcon, are better off exploring products like Mattel Ello blocks. While geared towards girls and are as pretty and pink as the best of them, Ello blocks allow for more creative play with the freedom to just build whatever their imagination desires, rather than being restricted to building a salon or a tree house.
We’d like you to join in on our office debate. What do you think of the new LEGO Friends line?
Comments
I love it and my daughter would love it. I really don’t see what the debate is about. Lego is mostly geared for boys so why can’t it be girlie??? My daughter received some lego for Christmas and the first thing she said was “this is for boys” Ha!!! I know that if it had a girlie touch, she would definitely love to play with it more
As a parent of a girl and a boy, LEGO Friends would have been a huge hit in my home (my kids are both older now). With a son who is still LEGO-centric, my daughter has been frustrated at times with how to find make-believe games they both get something out of. LEGO is still something they occasionally play together with, but my daughter has often lamented that there’s too much emphasis on “boy-stuff”. A Friends set or two would have been a welcome addition in our home to bridge that gap. I get the gender stereotyping issue, but for my family on a practical level, it would encourage my daughter to build more often, and a game they could both agree on. Building the intended structure is only the beginning—once you add a pile of other bricks to the mix, I’ve found that’s when the creativity really starts.
I love it! I have three girls and I definitely think they would be more into lego with this set. People who think its “pigeon holing” are thinking too much about it. In the end they w ill play with what they like and what they want.
Feels like pigeonholing by gender to me too and some form of assembly training. This isn’t the thrill of lego! I guess they see it as product differentiation. Let watch out for boy figurines and boy rooms and then co-ed packages and on and on but I’ll stick to the simple open building sets for my girls and boy.
This is a link to the letter submitted to LEGO by the Spark, which is the US-based organization spearheading the movement to ask LEGO to rethink its marketing.
http://www.sparksummit.com/2012/01/20/our-letter-to-lego/.
Hope it helps clarify what the concerns are…
Post a Comment
Our Commenting Policy
Manners are important to moms. So it won’t surprise you that at SavvyMom Media we try our best to keep the discussion respectful. While we hope you will share your thoughts in the comments, we ask that you keep it clean. Please avoid all profanity, derogatory terms, advertising/spam, and unsubstantiated personal attacks. If you see a comment that you feel is abusive, please .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
We promise not to delete your comments unless they violate these terms, though we sincerely hope we won’t have to make that decision. For more detail on our commenting policy and procedures, please see our complete Community Guidelines