My First not Lego order from Temu!

 

Hello Lego and not Lego people!

In February of this year, I learned about a new on-line shopping site called Temu. It was launched in September 2022, and is relatively new being very similar to Aliexpress.  They have different stores offering building block and minifigures, but the selection is nowhere as extensive as Aliexpress.  You get free shipping on your purchases, but you have to spend at least $20 CDN to qualify.

I decided to test them out and made an approx $20 order on Feb 24.  I found a Ghostbuster's Ecto-1 building block set that has 603 pieces sold by Mould King, set number 10021.  I also had a 30% off coupon, which meant I needed to buy more stuff in order to qualify for the free shipping, so I added 4 minifigures to my order.

My Temu purchases included tracking info so you could get the latest delivery information.  And it let me know that my package had arrived on March 7. So, end to end, it took only 11 days for my building block sets to arrive. Wow, superfast!

If for whatever reason your purchases do not arrived by a specified date, mine being March 8, Temu policy is to give you a $5 credit.

Mould King Model Car - No. Ghost Bus 10021, 8+, 603 pieces.  Looks like fun, I'll do a review for this set in the near future.

Three shiny minifigures cost 0.99 cents CDN each and the Star Wars minifigure cost $1.69 CDN.

The shiny minifigures are a good deal because on Aliexpress, they cost over $3 each. There are a total of six colours you can choose from on Temu.

According to the packaging, the Star Wars figure is Cal Kestis XP499.  I bought it for the BD-1 droid.

Here's the link to the Temu site.   Give them a try and get 30% off your first order with my code fav62990.

See you in my next post, bye!

Amazon Promo for the Funwhole F9010 Ruined Temple of the Jungle

 

For anyone looking to get the F9010 Ruined Temple of the Jungle set, Funwhole is offering a $30 Amazon gift card as a bonus.  Only until March 5th.

Visit their Instagram and Facebook pages for more details on how to pre-order from Amazon.

Don't forget to check out my full review here: https://its-not-lego.blogspot.com/2023/02/review-of-funwhole-f9010-ruined-temple.html

How much do Lego style base plates cost in 2023?

Hi brick fans!  Ever wonder who has the cheapest Lego compatible base plates out there, right now?  I'm talking specifically about the 10"x10" or 32x32 stud classic single sided base plates.

Here is a list of all of the places you can find base plates on-line and in bricks and mortar stores in 2023.  All pricing is in 🇨🇦 Canadian dollars excluding tax.

Lego

The original Lego base plate from Lego costs $9.99.  You can also find Lego base plates at all of the major retailers like Walmart (slightly cheaper at $9.83) and ToysRUs ($9.99), MastermindToys ($9.99) and Staples on-line ($9.99).  Amazon Canada matches their pricing of Lego base plates with Walmart pricing at $9.83.

I was going to check pricing at Indigo Canada, but they have taken their website off-line due to a cybersecurity breach at the moment.

Lego Compatible

Walmart has an exclusive toy brand called Play Day Toys which I think were originally called Brick Tech.  You can get the Play Day branded base plate for $7.97. They come in 4 different colours: Beige, Light Gray, Green and Blue.

In Canada, we have a discount retailer called Giant Tiger.  They have a Lego compatible base plate called Zuru Max Build More for $5.00 available in green and gray.

I checked BestBuy and Canadian Tire but they don't seem to carry much in the way of toys. As a result, I didn't find any Lego or Lego compatible base plates at these two retailers.  Discount retailer Dollarama doesn't carry any sort of Lego style base plates either.

Things used to be much cheaper on Aliexpress, but these days all of the Lego compatible bricks and parts have gone up in pricing, with very few stores still offering free shipping.  The cheapest base plates I could find on Aliexpress are from the Apan Sapio store at a total cost of $4.73. At least you don't have to pay any taxes on these items.

On Amazon, there are various generic branded baseplates where you can get a good deal if you buy them in lots of 4, 6 or 8.  For example, currently you can get a 6 pack of multi-coloured base plates for $22.94.  That works out to about $3.82 per base plate.  

If you buy more, the price comes down even more. For example this 12 pack of base plates from the Strictly Briks Amazon store costs $29.99 making the average cost of each base plate only $2.50 each.

But, by far the cheapest base plates available are through Dollar Tree for only $1.50 each!  Sold under the name Make-it Blocks.  They don't have a lot of stores where I live so I have to drive a bit to find one. And not all stores replenish their stock regularly.  I think that Dollar Tree has different coloured base plates but I've only ever seen brown coloured ones, which is fine by me.

So there you have it, Lego compatible base plates can range from $1.50 to $7.97 whereas actual Lego base plates will cost between $9.86 and $9.99.  If you know of any other retailers in Canada selling 32x32 stud base plates, please let me know!