There Will Never Be Another LEGO Club TV
Nostalgia is a funny thing, to say the least. It clouds one’s judgment of the past and creates a rose-tinted lens over things that may or may not even be good if viewed with an objective, critical eye. It can also create disdain or prejudice for what is new or does not align with what nostalgia deems as valuable.
Many fans of LEGO who grew up in the 80s and 90s want to see Classic Space or early Pirates sets take over shelves again, and licenses like Star Wars or superheroes fall to the wayside completely. Much of the Bionicle community of the 2000s longs for its hay day again. Before CCBS and Hero Factory, and certainly before its revival ended earlier than projected.
I was a kid in the mid-to-late 2000s—too young for Bionicle when it was in full stride, but just the right age for a marketing campaign that did a lot to define my view of The LEGO Group, the surrounding community, and the icons of the company I find most appealing: LEGO Club TV.
What Was LEGO Club TV?
Born out of a “pilot” episode covering NorthWest BrickCon in 2007 for the LEGO Club website, LEGO Club TV was an online, video-magazine format of LEGO Club magazine. LEGO Club TV (later The LEGO Club Show) was produced and run primarily by Roger Cameron, Creative Director for The LEGO Group, and Scott Decoteau, Associate Creative Director, with Heidi Bailey, the then Senior Brand Manager of LEGO Club, overseeing the project.
Scott Decoteau outside NorthWest BrickCon 2007, Source: YouTube
I was able to get in contact with them for a chat about how LEGO Club TV came to be:
Roger Cameron: Aside from making a video magazine for LEGO Club, we were given total creative control. It was pretty incredible. The head of LEGO Club at the time, Heidi Bailey, trusted us to concept and create from start to finish. I don’t think that freedom would exist today.
Scott Decoteau in The LEGO Club Show studio in Enfield, CN - Source: YouTube
Heidi Bailey, Former Senior Brand Manager, LEGO Club and LEGO Master Builder Academy
Heidi Bailey: What LEGO Club TV really came from was just the idea that, “Hey, we can do video on YouTube - why not? Let’s do it.” It was something I had to make a business case for—that this would actually help drive sales, honestly. Roger and Scott took it to the next level. They made their own little studio in the Enfield campus. I just let them go for it. They seemed like they had a lot of fun with it.
Roger Cameron: We actually started the first YouTube channel for LEGO under the channel name “LEGOClubTV” before there was the actual LEGO YouTube channel that’s still live today. At first it was just Scott and myself for the first few episodes.
Roger Cameron, Former Senior Creative Manager
Scott and I grew up on variety-show-type format shows like Sesame Street and The Muppet Show, and then, later in our youth, were influenced by a lot of skateboarding and snowboarding videos. We both shot and produced skateboarding and snowboarding videos in our spare time, so we were comfortable with cameras and editing software.
We eventually brought on Pat Healy to run cameras and edit so that I could concentrate on writing and directing. Eventually we started to right-size the team and brought on some project management to help with the scheduling and logistics with outside animators.
An interview with Roger and Scott about LEGO Club Show from LEGO Brickmaster Magazine, July-August 2009
Early videos posted to the channel focused on interviews at Brickworld 2008, some advertisements for both LEGO Club and BrickMaster, and the Space Police series directed and animated by Paganomation.
The LEGO Club Show officially began in 2010 and the content found in each episode reflected the material and segments found in both LEGO Club and BrickMaster magazine. Staples of the magazines included features like interviews with designers and writers in charge of upcoming LEGO projects or “Cool Creations” that found video adaptations, the latter of which had a unique spin on it.
LEGO Club TV reflects the energy surrounding both the broader and budding internet community at the time and The LEGO Group: fresh, innovative, and finding its groove.
The shape that the LEGO community has taken today was in its infancy in the 2000s. AFOLs were a fringe group—the earliest LEGO User Groups were less than ten years old, and LEGO fan events and conventions were just starting. BrickCon, the longest-running show, was in its fifth year in 2007, and Brickworld Chicago’s inaugural show came the same year.
Brickworld Chicago 2007, Source: Brickworld
Heidi: At the time when YouTube was first starting, it was a lot about that grassroots just-go-for-it type of stuff. Which I know still happens now, but it’s been around for so long now that it’s hard to replicate the kind of innocence of what was going on then.
The Citizen of the Year (2004) - Source: YouTube
There was a lot of potential and excitement at this time, especially since The LEGO Group was on the path to renewed financial stability and success. The attempts to depart from the brick in favor of strange product lines like Galidor were gone—the brick was once again the crux of The LEGO Group’s products and mission.
That renewed importance of the LEGO brick and its possibilities can be found across all of The LEGO Club Show’s content, be it through Cool Creations, the one-off gags and segments surrounding Scott in the studio playing with LEGO bricks, or the music videos whose lyrics and visuals encouraged creative play.
We’ll be looking at just two key segments from The LEGO Club Show today (with a deeper dive into the music videos and The Adventures of Max shorts at a later time). Special thanks to Roger Cameron and Heidi Bailey for taking the time to answer my questions. It has been an amazing experience to get behind-the-scenes information about one of my favorite pieces of The LEGO Group’s marketing and history from those who helped create it.
“Oh Snap” - Cool and Creative Uses of LEGO Bricks
The influences on the content of LEGO Club TV were vast and often very specific to Roger and Scott’s upbringing and personal tastes. One of their influences - extreme sports - was more explicitly found across The LEGO Club Show’s run through the variety segments, later titled “Oh Snap” when they were uploaded individually on the LEGO Club TV channel.
Source: YouTube
“Oh Snap” highlighted out-of-the-box ways to use LEGO bricks. Take for instance the first occurrence of this segment where Scott visited an indoor skate park and challenged professional skaters there to ollie a tower of LEGO bricks that increased in height with every successful run (this challenge was aptly titled “How Many Bricks” and later adapted for snowboarding).
Not only did this challenge showcase a unique use of LEGO bricks, a discussion on the influence of LEGO on one skater’s life was held, connecting back to the philosophy and core goals of The LEGO Group.
It’s Missing a Mailbox - Cool Creations’ Craziest Host
As a video-magazine format of LEGO Club, LEGO Club TV/LEGO Club Show translated many of the regular segments of the magazine to the show. “Cool Creations” had been the name of the section that highlighted kids’ own creations for years (as far back as LEGO Mania Magazine). The print magazine had never had a mascot host the segment.
LEGO Club Magazine Jan-Feb 2009, Source: Internet Archive
[LEGO Magazine Nov-Dec 2006 - Source: Internet Archive
Roger: We wanted to do the video version of the “Cool Creations” section of the magazine, and the idea was to have it be hosted by two people. In some of the promotional materials for the LEGO Club, Erik Varsegi, one of the Enfield-based Masterbuilders, had made a life-size yellow mailbox. The idea of making the mailbox a character popped into my head while at San Diego Comic-Con one year.
When I returned home, I went into the model shop to ask Eric if I could add some eyes to the yellow mailbox he had built and had at his desk, and boom, Flappy was born. For the voice of Flappy, I guess I was inspired partly by the character Butters from South Park. It was a lot of fun to write the script for those segments and have the banter back and forth between Flappy and Scott.
In one of my favorite recurring gags, after Scott presents a creation, Flappy insists it is missing a very important element: a mailbox. Another gag that is just as amusing is Flappy pretending he’s a fire-breathing dragon, bouncing around the screen as Scott tries to provide information on where to send photos of cool creations.
Source: YouTube
Much like with The Amazing Redini’s presence in the “Mailbag” segment of LEGO Magazine, a lot of charm was brought to “Cool Creations” that helped make Flappy a lasting mascot for those who grew up with LEGO Club TV.
Now On DVD: The LEGO Club Show and the Best of 2011
In 2011, a DVD of highlights from The LEGO Club Show and other media being produced for the LEGO Club TV YouTube channel during that time was inserted into every issue of LEGO Club magazine. This was one of my favorite DVDs as a kid, and was my go-to on sick days from school.
Source: Internet archive
Alongside segments like “Oh Snap,” the music videos, and The Adventures of Max shorts, promotional material for products released in 2011 was also featured on the disc. This included a stop-motion recreation of the Cars 2 trailer to tie in with the sets released that year, LEGO City Police shorts, Alien Conquest shorts, and an episode of the newly released Hero Factory TV special.
This DVD was a great gateway into accessing LEGO Club TV for kids who may not have been aware of its presence on YouTube or LEGO.com at the time. It also now serves as a time capsule for The LEGO Group’s products and promos from that year.
New Members to the Club Means Changes to the Club
2012 marked the end of the LEGO Club TV channel as YouTube became a far more viable mode of promotion for The LEGO Group. October 2012 saw the last video posted to the channel, and April of 2012 saw the first video posted to the official LEGO channel.
End card of video promoting the new official lego YouTube channel on the LEGOCLUBTV channel- Source: YouTube
Heidi: There was a point in time where everybody in the company realized how important YouTube could be. Honestly, we never did any search terms to make the content more discoverable. It was this side thing that I was doing in addition to the website, the magazine and the events we had for the club. So they hired somebody in the UK to manage everything on YouTube.
There will never be another LEGO Club TV. Arguably designed partly in response to The LEGO Group’s financial failures and process of rebuilding itself as a competitive and premium brand, LEGO Club TV and The LEGO Club Show excelled in getting across the idea that the LEGO brick and its infinite opportunities for creative, innovative play were the crux of the company’s product and mission. None of this I believe would have been possible without Roger and Scott’s combined creative forces.
Roger: Scott was an incredible creative partner. I would always refer to our dynamic like 1+1 =3. The creative output was always greater than the sum of its parts. Ideas would build off of one another, and we could often complete each other’s sentences in situations. The alignment was there, and we just clicked. Unfortunately, we lost Scott in an accident in 2018, but we have our work together to remember him by.
The company’s current landscape has shifted as popular culture and technology have. The brick is still at its core, but as a whole, the LEGO Group has begun to lean into the brick as a lifestyle. The fringe nature of AFOLs has begun to fade away, creating a more open and accessible hobby through the proliferation of adult-oriented sets designed for display.
Source: LEGO
The marketing targeted at younger fans of LEGO is akin to social media trends found on Instagram and TikTok. “Rebrickulous,” a concept headed by Roger Cameron after LEGO Club TV, focused on challenges using LEGO bricks in the vein of content from YouTube channels like Dude Perfect, was an evolution of “Oh Snap.” Much of the content presently being developed for the LEGO YouTube channel focuses on influencers across social media, who either interact with LEGO bricks in some way or participate in extremely elaborate challenges and games akin to something Mr. Beast would produce.
LEGO Club TV did a lot of good for The LEGO Group in experimenting with the YouTube landscape, allowing the company to reach a new audience of kids like me at the time. Will there ever be another LEGO Club TV? Sadly no, I don’t think so. I feel like the LEGO Group’s current marketing direction for kids is missing the charm, authenticity, and creative energy that Roger and Scott brought to LEGO Club TV. But that’s probably just my nostalgia talking.
Do you remember LEGO Club TV? What was your favorite segment from The LEGO Club Show? Let us know in the comments below!
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