UPDATE: Target’s Toy Sale catalogue has finally been revealed. Read the July 2015 Sales Post for all the details.
Update: Big W & Kmart catalogue deals added!
Here we are! At the start of one of the most hectic, stressful and exciting times of the year – the Australian mid-year Toy Sale! In the interest of not spamming sales posts every other day, I’ll be aggregating all the Toy Sale catalogues from major retailers in this single post so that you have all the sales and deals at your fingertips.
If you have been following my blog for awhile, you may also have noticed that I have put together a separate post which lists all the big ticket exclusives that each retailer has.
Any big LEGO sale tends to bring out the worst in the LEGO community, most of the time caused by overzealous AFOLs. I will never forget last year’s toy sale when I saw a bunch of people (you know who you are) clear out ALL the Parisian Restaurants in Myer Melbourne on several large trolleys.
Here’s a few handy tips to help you get what you want and preserve your sanity of mind during this chaotic season.
- Be calm, be kind and be considerate to other shoppers and the sales assistants.
- Never hesitate when it comes to buying a popular set. If you sleep on it, it might not be on the shelves when you return
- When in doubt, layby
- Forget online shopping – the retailers have atrocious e-commerce systems. Your best bet will always to shop in-store
- Can’t find what you want? Give stores a call to see if they actually have them in stock. You might even be able to place the items on hold or get them delivered to you.
- If you don’t want to get stressed out, just give the sales a miss and buy stuff at full price
- Lastly, remember that LEGO is just a toy and a hobby
Big W Toy Sale 2015 (Catalogue link 25 June – 8 July)
Big W has released their Toy Sale 2015 catalogue, titled Total Toy Domination 2 and it is packed with over 6 pages of LEGO deals and promotions. I won’t list down all the sales, but I’ll pick out a couple of highlights on what I think are the best deals contained in the catalogue.
Big W’s catalogues are always a little confusing, as they enjoy discounting specific sets rather than applying a blanket discount like other retailers. That’s compounded by the fact that Big W’s regular prices tend to be a little lower than the RRP. For comparison’s sake, I’ll be including the standard RRP of the sets instead of Big W’s everyday low prices.
The big draws in their 2015 mid-year toy sale catalogues are the Star Wars 75059 UCS Sandcrawler, 76042 SHIELD Helicarrier and 60098 Heavy Haul Train. Overall, I’m very impressed by Big W’s toy sale catalogue – there are some great details for City, Elves, Friends, Jurassic World and Pirates fans. Their prices are hard to beat and are a little better than the usual 20% discount you would get elsewhere!
The Big W Toy Sale catalogue kicks off on the 25th of June but if you have an Everyday Rewards Card, the discounts are applicable at checkout after scanning it. Happy shopping!
Here are my top picks from Big W’s catalogue:
Big W Exclusives:
- 76042 SHIELD Helicarrier- $475 (RRP $500)
- 75059 UCS Sandcrawler – $398 (RRP $450)
- 60098 Heavy Haul Train – $225 (RRP $250)
- 60062 Arctic Ice Breaker – $128 (RRP $150)
- 70730 Ninjago Cycle Ambush – $48 (RRP $50)
- 41107 Friends Pop Star Limo – $34 (RRP $40)
- 31025 Creator Mountain Hut – $49 (RRP $60)
- 31010 Creator Treehouse – $49 (RRP $50)
Curiously, no idea why the Mountain Hut and Treehouse are tagged as exclusives since they’re pretty old sets. Kind of like the opposite of a timed early exclusive.
Elves
- 41075 The Elves’ Treetop Hideaway – $54 (RRP $80)
- 41073 Naida’s Epic Adventure Ship – $32 (RRP $45)
Pirates
- 70413 The Brick Bounty – $99 (RRP $140)
- 70412 Soldier’s Fort – $35 (RRP $50)
- 70410 Soldiers Outpost – $20 (RRP $30)
- 70411 Treasure Island – $20 (RRP $30)
Friends
- 41095 Emma’s House – $70 (RRP $100)
- 41094 Heartlake Lighthouse – $40 (RRP $60)
- 41097 Heartlake Hot Air Balloon – $30 (RRP $45)
- 41085 Vet Clinic – $20 (RRP $30)
Disney Princess
- 41063 Ariel’s Undersea Palace – $56 (RRP $80)
- 41061 Jasmine’s Exotic Palace – $25 (RRP $35)
City
- 60047 Police Station – $94 (RRP $150)
- 60076 Demolition Site – $69 (RRP $100)
- 60084 Racing Bike Transporter – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60081 Pickup Tow Truck – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60002 Fire Truck – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60043 Prisoner Transporter – $20 (RRP $30)
Minecraft
- 21118 The Mine – $98 (RRP $140)
- 21116 Crafting Box – $59 (RRP $80)
Juniors
- 10687 Spider-Man Hideout – $29 (RRP $40)
Jurassic World
- 75917 Raptor Rampage – $59 (RRP $80)
- 75916 Dilophosaurus Ambush – $35 (RRP $50)
Kmart Toy Sale 2015 (Catalogue link 25 June – 15 July)
Kmart is also entering the fray with their mid-year Toy Sale catalogue, but unfortunately, there’s not a lot to get excited about in their catalogue. Kmart is light on exclusives and they lack any sort of flagship LEGO set in their arsenal.
Also, they seem to be trying their best to outdo their efforts in horribly designed catalogues. Kmart’s point of difference is a plethora of sets on sale for $20. They’re pretty decent deals if you’re into impulse LEGO buys!
Speaking of exclusives, Kmart only has 41108 Heartlake Food Market and 10697 Classic Creative XXXL Box in their stable, which is pretty underwhelming. The XXXL Box is decent for parts since it packs 1500 pieces, which is great value for $79.
Like Big W’s catalogue, here’s a list of highlights in Kmart’s Toy Sale offering. RRP is based on the set’s regular price, not Kmart’s own reduced everyday prices.
Kmart Exclusives
- 10697 Classic Creative XXXL Box – $79 (RRP $90)
- 41108 Heartlake Food Market – $59 (RRP $60) [lame…]
Notable Deals
- 60036 City Arctic Base Camp – $99 (RRP $130)
- 60047 City Police Station – $94 (RRP $150)
- 41076 Elves Farran and the Crystal Hollow – $19 (RRP $25)
- 60076 City Demolition Site – $69 (RRP $100)
- 41072 Elves Naida’s Spa Secret – $20 (RRP $30)
- 70745 Ninjago Anacondrai Crusher – $20 (RRP $30)
- 70755 Ninjago Jungle Raider – $20 (RRP $30)
- 70167 Ultra Agents Invizable Gold Getaway – $20 (RRP $30)
- 70411 Pirates Treasure Island – $20 (RRP $30)
- 41085 Friends Vet Clinic – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60043 City Prisoner Transporter – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60057 City Camper Van – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60073 City Service Truck – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60081 City Pickup Tow Truck – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60082 City Dune Buggy Trailer – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60083 City Snowplough Truck – $20 (RRP $30)
- 60084 City Racing Bike Transporter – $20 (RRP $30)
- 70819 The LEGO Movie Bad Cop Car Chase – $20 (RRP $30)
Myer Toy Sale 2015 (Catalogue link 10 June – 12 July)
UPDATE: The Detective’s Office and Palace Cinema keep coming in and out as limited stock online. Try your luck, you may be able to get your hands on one if you’re lucky.
Myer is first out the gates (as usual) with 20% off all LEGO from today (10 June) till 12 July 2015. The sale is both online and instore, but most of the big exclusives like the Modular buildings (Detective’s Office and Palace Cinema) have already sold out online. Myer’s other big exclusive is the Star Wars UCS Slave 1, which is on offer for $239.
- LEGO 75060 UCS Slave 1 – $239 (RRP $299) [sold out online]
- LEGO 10246 Detective’s Office – $179 (RRP $229)
[sold out online] - LEGO 10232 Palace Cinema – $159 (RRP $199)
[sold out online] - LEGO 10242 Creator Mini Cooper – $119 (RRP $149)
- LEGO 10220 Creator Volkswagen T1 Camper Van – $134 (RRP $169) [sold out online]
I expect the UCS Slave 1, Detective’s Office and Palace Cinema to all sell out within the first few days of the sale (if not today), so good luck if you’re looking to get one!
Watch this space, I’ll update this post with details of more retailer catalogues when they go live! Up next should be Big W’s Toy Sale catalogue, which should go live on the 25th of June!
DO back on the shelf at Emporium, x3 left as of 1pm today.
Thanks for the heads up, Steve!
Popped in to Myer in Shellharbour yesterday to see if I could hold off buying anything (I did!) and there seemed to be heaps of stock. Lots of the older and some newer superheroes including carnage and gorilla grodd. It’s a shame people can’t wait for new sets to be ‘less new’ and go on sale. There were heaps about! As for shoulder barging or hip bumping, there was none that I could see (I was alone in the whole dept!!)
..
Are you Melbournites a bit of a rowdy bunch?
It certainly is a good reminder that if people are squabbling over plastic toys, you’re in a pretty sad state of affairs. Sad, pathetic scalpers- get a grip.
Morning Nick! Yeah, Myer has been fantastic with ensuring that stock levels remained high – except for some of the more exciting pieces like the Slave 1 and Palace Cinema. I had a Myer voucher and snagged the Carnage set (only paid $6!) last weekend!
I think there was just a lot of hustle, bustle and excitement when the sale started. Y’know, overeager fans who are fearful of ‘missing out’!
The carnage set looked great .. I picked it up myself! Oops!
Just stumbled across this-
http://www.wollongongcentral.com.au/what-s-happening/toy-brick-fair?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Post&utm_campaign=Toy%20Brick%20Fair
And TRU:
http://catalogues.toysrus.com.au/catalogue/super-toy-sale/14344111773954.html?utm_rel=tru-homepage-carousel-1#pageNo=0
Cool, thanks for the heads up! I’m breaking another piece of juicy news (writing the post now)! I’ll update the sale thread after that. Thanks!
Big W’s toy sale catalogue is now online:
http://www.bigw.com.au/bigw-catalogues#view=catalogue2&saleId=9087&page=1&preview=SpecialPreviewTTD2015
Detective’s Office back on the shelves at Myer Emporium (x7 left) as of 1pm today.
They had the Palace cinema but the last one went while I was there (it wasn’t me!).
Thanks for the update! Great news all around that there seems to be so much stock of the Detective’s Office going around! Win win for all fans
Ive checked Myer Emporium almost every lunch to kill time as I work nearby. I saw two Kombi’s once and have never ever seen a modular there during this sale, not that I will ever buy from them. I gave up after last few years and just bought everything that is hard to find and i wanted from lego.com and get my vip points.
See people with absolute piles of stuff, they need to limit 1 per customer. I want the town hall but refuse to buy it brand new in box from ebay, these resellers are scum. I would only bid on a used set.
There is a really good lego store on lygon st somewhere. forgot what its called.
Oh cool. I work near the CBD too and pop by whenever I can. The shelves are pretty bleak, which is strange since you’d expect the flagship Myer toy store to have the most stock.
They apparently had a limit of 3 sets per customer, but I don’t think it was enforced too tightly. I’ve seen people carting away trolleys before.
Are you referring to ShopforMe? I don’t have a very high opinion of them as I suspect that they’re responsible for buying sale stock from Myer and selling them for RRP on their site.
No hard evidence but recently after the Myer sale began, they mysteriously had stock of Slave 1s. Same story last year when the Parisian Restaurant was the hottest item. I saw a bunch of guys literally buy a whole cage full of PRs and ShopforMe miraculously had them in stock the very next day.
I know it’s pretty unsubstantiated, but the coincidence makes me feel uneasy.
As of today slave 1, palace cinema and creator vw kombi have disappeared off the myer online site.
The entry for Slave 1 has disappeared on their site but it seems like you can still access it via the direct link
Can verify the direct link works – order from this the other day and stock is on the way.
Wish I had direct link for palace cinema.
My friend bumped into the shopforme store owner at myer. She said she saw him buying detectives office and slave 1. Also went over to say hi. …awkward
For Perth AFOLs I was at Myer Morley tonight and they had plenty of Detective Office, VW Kombi Van, Mini Cooper. A few Technic 24 Hours Race Car (which I picked up at David Jones last weekend because they had 20% off already). Did not see Slave 1 or Palace Cinema.
Update: at Perth city Myer right now and there’s a decent amount off all the sets I listed, including Slave 1 (about 10) but no Palace Cinema.
Myer is an absolute joke. Seriously. Rang the Knox store at 9am to see if I could reserve a DO for pickup later in the day since I was at work and the catalogue was only released the day before. Was told that I couldn’t since it’s a popular seller. So I asked them how many sets they had. The answer? 4!! What the….? You tell me that it’s a best seller and you only stock 4. No surprises, all gone when I got there just after 4 yesterday. Never had this problem at David Jones.
Ugh, that’s terrible to hear. My guess is that people bought it on the preview sale or they were simply not allocated enough OR they sold out almost immediately when doors opened.
We’re in an interesting place, with LEGO being the most popular it’s ever been. This year’s toy sale certainly seems like much more of a mess/scuffle compared to last year’s. With LEGO being so popular, it’s kind of believable that more people are looking to profit from fans.
Got my slave 1 at Myer perth today.
Both the Slave 1 and the DO were limited to three per customer.
Note to West Aussies – When I went at 2PM today, they had HEAPS. Apparently they sold out this morning and restocked.
Also important, no palace cinema. I actually wanted to save money and get that instead. Oh well, Slave 1 onto lay-buy 😀
Also important – I have confirmed that Joondalup Myer has sold out of Slave 1s
That’s great to hear that limits were being enforced. Heard that some places still allowed unlimited or multiple transaction purchases to get around the limits.
Thanks for the on the ground report!
I’m a complete noob when it comes to collecting Lego.
Does anyone know if any of the following sets are likely to be available and discounted during the upcoming toy sales: Lego Creator Bike Shop and Cafe (31026), Lego Modular Grand Emporium (10211), Lego Modular Fire Brigade (10197), Lego Modular Town Hall (10224), Lego Modular Pet Shop (10218) and Lego Modular Parisian Cafe (10243).
I understand that the Grand Emporium, Fire Brigade and Town Hall were all retired in 2015, but I’m not sure whether that means they’re completely unavailable in stores.
Thanks in advance for any assistance/information.
Hey, welcome to collecting LEGO! Everyone was a noob once so don’t feel too bad.
The Grand Emporium, Fire Brigade and Town Hall are all retired, so there’s pretty much 0 chance finding it in stores. You should be able to get the Creator Bike Shop quite easily during the sale! If you can’t find it in Myer, remember you can always try to price match at David Jones or Target if they have it in stock.
For the Parisian Restaurant, the independent retail stores (Toyworld/I’m Rick James Bricks) have it for this toy sale season, so you should try your luck there.
Let me know if I can help with anything else!
Thanks Jay! I appreciate the information.
I’ll check my local Toyworld for the Parisian Restaurant. Is Toyworld likely to have the Pet Shop too or is that unavailable in Australia?
Also, since I’m trawling for information, do you have any suggestions for buying used/second hand versions of the retired Lego Modular sets? I’ll concentrate on buying those which are available first and foremost, but would Ebay be the best resource for the others?
No worries, I’m very happy to help!
Pet shop might be a long shot, but with Toyworlds, you never know. The Pet Shop is widely speculated to get retired very, very soon. I’d recommend grabbing one online from LEGO.com ASAP to avoid missing out and having to deal with resellers.
For used/secondhand modulars, eBay tends to be a little pricey. You can also try Gumtree as quite a lot of people list their LEGO there. Have you heard of LEGO Buy/Sell/Swap Australia?? It’s an online Facebook group where you can buy or sell LEGO. Again, a lot of sellers there and you can put up a post stating which modulars you’re looking for and see what’s available.
Thanks again Jay!
I really appreciate all of the knowledge you shared.
For Parisan Restaurant – catchoftheday.com.au currently has it for 229.00
Thanks for the heads up! Is that inclusive of shipping as well?
Its 10 dollars for shipping most places.
I bought the VW Kombi for 129.00 on there the other day – but its back up to 149.00 now.
For Canberra based people Toyworld has Parisan for 249. I was really lucky and got one from Toyworld ballarat for 178.
How did you get the Parisian for so cheap? Can I get it at this price in other stores?
Thanks Nate.
I found it at Toot Toot Toys where it is slightly cheaper and the postage was also less:
http://www.toottoottoys.com.au/products/lego-creator-parisian-restaurant-10244
They also had one Pet Shop left in stock, but I think they’re all sold out now.
A TOY!? HOBBY!? Nonsense, LEGO is a way of LIFE, my friend! I do it every day. I LEGO. (Let’s make LEGO a verb.)
Haha everything in balance and moderation! LEGO is already kind of a word – it means “play well” in Danish!
This morning there was plenty of adrenaline going into myer since I saw the website listing the kombi and DO out of stock… I was a man on a mission. Doncaster westfield was like a battlefield. Slave 1 was in such demand that I did see a few hip and shoulder bumps.
Plenty of scalpers with dirty satisfied smirks when they purchased their items (3 of the same).
Lucky for me the staff member recognized me and asked what I wanted and got the kombi and DO (one of the last sets) out the back and told me next time to speak with him before the sale and he’ll hold it until the close of business on sale day. My faith in humanity is restored! (And I don’t have to go to work late!)
Wow Matt, that’s quite a story! Glad you managed to get the DO – it’s an especially hot item this season. There were none at Fountain Gate when I checked earlier.
The scalpers bit is an unfortunate by-product of LEGO being so popular – people are always going to find ways to exploit the community. I think that 3 per customer is still a little high, but it’s a good thing that there are limits now since there weren’t any last year. That said, I don’t think it was enforced across the board.
Oh well, this happens every Toy Sale, but I think this year has gotten a lot worse. It’s really a bummer for fans who really want to own and build these sets but miss out just because they couldn’t get to a Myer first thing in the morning today.
Also, congrats on scoring and surviving the sale!
Humanity? You are kidding right? Its back door and just as bad as scalping because it’s not fair.
Slave I at Myer Emporium went really quick, all gone as of 1pm today unless they have more out the back.
Apparently they’ve been sneakily restocking the shelves throughout the day. Myer Emporium is their flagship store, so it would make sense that they’d be allocated the most stock.