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Legal Issues with Selling Retail Merchandise


Illuminatus

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I recently came into possession of a promotional Toa Inika cloth flag after kindly asking a small shop owner if they'd consider giving it away; they had no use for it so they agreed.

 

I see a lot of these are listed and sold on BrickLink as well as here, along with other promotional retail items like display cases, sometimes pretty expensively on account of their exclusivity.

 

I can't help but wonder, though: given these items' promotional purpose, is it technically legal to buy and sell them? I know for a fact that store owners aren't allowed to sell point-of-sale materials to consumers at least until a certain point. I suppose most of them do anyway after the items have long expired their commercial value.

 

Still, my question is, how legally justified is all of this? Am I missing something obvious or is it indeed a more delicate subject?

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  • 2 weeks later...

You're in the clear, although the shop owner likely violated some agreement with LEGO by selling it to you. LEGO would prefer that these things don't get out, but they're unlikely to do anything about you selling it.

 

The biggest reason for non-commercial items to not be sold is that they're not designed to meet the same regulations or quality standards as things designed to be sold. I'd be surprised if there was a serious reason for LEGO to worry about that with a store display, but they have been known to mold parts for the LEGOLAND parks out of plastics that would be considered too brittle for use by a child (clear jumper plates being the usual example). Similarly, you'll see food manufacturers label things "not for individual retail sale" because they'd be subject to different laws regarding labeling on the packaging. LEGO actually held back some AFOL support in the US one year for the same reason because a new law required every bag to have a particular choking hazard warning on it.

 

Where you're talking about a cloth flag, material quality concerns and health concerns aren't really a factor here...LEGO's biggest concern would be if it showed up somewhere inappropriate and made LEGO look bad.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Are you selling it?

  • Upvote 1

Steam Name: Toa Hahli Mahri. Xbox Live Gamertag: Makuta. Minecraft Username: ThePoohster.

Wants: 2003 Jaller (from Jaller and Gukko), Exo-Toa, Turaga Nuju, Turaga Vakama, Shadow Kraata, Axonn, Brutaka, Vezon & Fenrakk, Nocturn, ORANGE FIKOU.

I got rid of my picture, are you happy?

 

 

 

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