Everything Is Awesome If You’re Lego: Toy Company Can Do No Wrong

How good of a run has Lego been on in recent years?

Consider the following:

It’s the subject of the country’s top movie. The Lego Movie has gotten great reviews and is easily the biggest box office hit of the year thus far. The movie has been such a success that not one but two Lego spinoff films are already in the works.

Sales, revenues, and profits are soaring. As Bloomberg and others noted this week, a report from Lego stated that company revenues rose 10% year over year, and that net income was up an impressive 9%. In a statement accompanying the release, Lego CEO Joergen Vig Knudstorp said, “In less than 10 years, we have now more than quadrupled our revenue.”

Growth is especially good in China. Lego soon expects China, the world’s largest country by population, to be one of its “core markets,” alongside Europe and the U.S., according to the Associated Press.

It expects to keep creaming the competition for years. Reuters focused on Lego’s modest announcement that the company anticipates staying “moderately ahead” of the pace of overall sales in the global toy market in the years to come. Bear in mind that the sales surge enjoyed by Lego has occurred a time when major toy companies such as Mattel have seen sales slump.

Even the “worst” Lego series is huge hit. When Lego Friends was launched in 2012, the girl-friendly series—featuring loads of pink and purple bricks for building beauty shops, fashion workshops, and the like—was bashed as offensive. The Lego line is so “jam-packed with condescending stereotypes it would even make Barbie blush,” summed up one group, which put Friends on a short list of the worst toys of the year.

Plenty of people—including, most importantly, young girls and their families—thought differently. Lego Friends wound up being honored by Toy Industry Association as the Toy of the Year in 2013. In terms of sales, Lego Friends has been a monster success story. “The line doubled sales expectations in 2012, the year it launched,” an NPR story published last summer on the Friends phenomenon stated. “Sales to girls tripled in just that year.”

All said, Lego has to agree with the signature song of its hit movie: “Everything Is Awesome.”