The next batch of January 2023 LEGO GWPs (gift with purchase) are now available, and LEGO are hoping you’re going to spend big to redeem one of them!
40583 Houses of the World 1, 40605 Lunar New Year VIP Add-On Pack, and 40575 Year of the Rabbit are now available for qualifying purchases when you shop on LEGO.com from 15 – 25 January 2023.
Here are the spend thresholds for each:
- 40583 Houses of the World 1 – US$250 / AU$400 / £220 / €250 / CAD$350
- 40575 Year of the Rabbit – US$85 / AU$140 / £80 / €85 / CAD$115
- 40605 Lunar New Year VIP Add-On Pack – US$50 / AU$80 / £45 / €50 / CAD$65
You can find more information on your respective regional Sales & Offers page:
- LEGO Offers and Promotions [US]
- LEGO Offers and Promotions [AUS]
- LEGO Offers and Promotions [UK]
- LEGO Offers and Promotions [EU]
- LEGO Offers and Promotions [CA]
Interestingly, there’s some additional fine print added to the GWP Terms and Conditions where Pick a Brick (Standard) orders are not valid to trigger GWPs. As the service isn’t back yet, I haven’t tested it out, but I’m not happy with this as it reduces the number of things you can order to trigger the GWP – a very unfair move in my opinion, that further penalises LEGO’s most passionate fans.
Do note that I’ve been able to trigger GWPs with Pick a Brick as recent as before Christmas, so hopefully this is one of those rules like the household limit that aren’t enforced.
I don’t think there’s good value here, and this reeks of 76210 Hulkbuster where LEGO are trying ridiculous prices and increasing these thresholds without providing commensurate in return.
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It’s pretty wild that 40583 Houses of the World 1 will cost US$250 / AU$400 / £220 / €250 in sets to redeem, making it the most expensive LEGO gift-with-purchase yet.
There are only a handful of sets that will instantly qualify you for the GWP, and with news that online Pick a Brick Standard orders being excluded, you’ll really need to dig deep to afford it.
I think the Houses of the World set is nice, but not nice enough for me to consider dropping AU$400 on, especially being so close to the 40580 Blacktron Cruiser promotion.
Also remember that there are THREE more Houses of the World in this series, so you’ll need to spend AU$1600 or US$1000 on LEGO sets JUST to collect the entire series.
The 40575 Year of the Rabbit is also available when you spend US$85 / AU$140 / £80 / €85 or more on LEGO.com, stacking with all order GWPs.
The online LEGO.com price for Australia seems high, especially when the LEGO Certified Stores, and even Myer are giving it away on spends of AU$88 or more, so if you want this one, just go to the Aussie LEGO Stores if you can.
And last but not least, LEGO VIP members will receive 40605 Lunar New Year VIP Add-On Pack when you spend US$50 / AU$80 / £45 / €50 on LEGO.com. It’s a fun Lunar New Year-themed VIP Add on Pack, with plenty of cool Chinese New Year-themed accessories!
What do you think of the incredibly high GWP thresholds? Will you be making any orders to trigger Houses of the World?
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First off, I LOVE Legos, doing with family or by myself, and I love getting all the great detail provided in your blogs. But I have to say am incredibly disappointed at some of Leif’s recent changes, especially all of these crazy price increase!! I understand that cost of production and inflation cause most of it, but the increases are not proportionally even. And then, the crazy high thresholds on the GWP is ridiculous!! It would be one thing if the GWP was worth it, extra special, unique, or exclusive… but they are not. And the fact this is just the 1st of the Houses of the World series/collections , I don’t see many people being able to afford and collect them all. And as cute as this 1st house looks, there is nothing special about it and if you are going to have houses from around the world, they should connected to its location and culture. This house could really be anywhere. Sorry, just a little frustrated and really disappointed in the GWP series.
It thanks for all you do!! I really enjoy your blogs!
Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Pamela!
Yeah, it’s a weird one, and doesn’t seem to scream much value, which is why the incredibly high threshold is so jarring.
It’s best for all of us (and I need to work on this too), to just develop better defences against FOMO!
I just did a PAB order that qualified the Blacktron cruiser so I think your info may be off or they just did this today….
I did a chat with a LEGO Rep at the beginning of January and was able to use Pick A Brick purchases to count towards a GWP (Blacktron!!!). Only caveat was the parts had to be designated “Best Seller.” Per the rep, because the bestsellers ship from the same warehouse they count.
I live in the US, YMMV.
Ah that’s interesting. Over here in Australia, Standard PAB orders seemed okay, and I was able to trigger GWPs with my last order, which was sometime in October/November last year.
Has PAB Standard (the replacement for Bricks and Pieces) been valid for GWPs? I’ve not seen it valid in the past. PAB Bestseller is usually valid, though that limits the pieces you can purchase.
The House is too expensive. That’s a nope. Probably cheaper to get them from resellers on eBay / Bricklink.
My last PAB order which had mostly Standard elements triggered GWPs, so it’s definitely worked in the past. Itching for it to come back online and for me to try it out!
Well, it is a pretty substantial build, but both the subject and the pieces feel pretty uninteresting. With the high threshold, it’s hard to see that this would be an incentive big enough for more than a small niche of buyers.
“Do note that I’ve been able to trigger GWPs with Pick a Brick as recent as before Christmas, so hopefully this is one of those rules like the household limit that aren’t enforced.”
My $200 order that included $60 pick a brick was declined for being eligible for gwp back in November:( I was told pick a brick counted as a separate order *eye roll*
So long GWPs. I liked the GWPs for reducing the price per part when ordering from PaB, but I guess I’ll resort to Bricklink for parts sourcing henceforth. It’s only when Double VIP-points and multiple GWPs are in effecti that it may actually be better value ordering from Lego rather than buying from retailers.
So…we are talking about 1.000 euros to being able to get the full set of 4 houses?
Broke: spending $400 on sets just to get the GWP
Woke: buying the GWP from a reseller/buying the parts and building it yourself
Bespoke: spending $400 on sets to get the GWP, holding onto them until they retire, then selling those sets at a profit, thus getting the GWP for negative dollars
Should I have to do this? No. Should LEGO just sell the Houses of the World series as regularly sets? Absolutely. But we play the hand we’re dealt.
I live in the UK so swap $ for £, but you’ve pretty much nailed exactly how I feel. It’s a real Stockholm syndrome feeling and the only way we can change it is to not play the game.
This isn’t the response I expected from the VIP surveys but I guess I shouldn’t have been as naïve.
Yes, it’s becoming very awkwardly uncomfortable to buy LEGO…. So much so that one of my New Year’s resolutions was to thin out my collection, by selling off some of the older sets I have.
I agree with other people that LEGO is trying to push the limit of becoming I profitable again; like the early 2000’s ?
Lego is a kid toy mostly, and now you have attracted adults too, like me. But those adults might have kids and are dealing with huge inflation for everything in life that is all MORE important than buying bricks.
And to top it off, it’s a “meh” set of a house anyway; not something I would put on the shelves with the other pieces I have.
LEGO ?…. You want your new year resolution to be that you get sidelined for sales ?… because it looks like you’re trying really hard to do so.
And all those little houses ?… Those will go to scalpers a lot, who will try to sell them for ridiculous prices on eBay or bricklink; and won’t sell them either, because it’s still the same “meh” set.
I guarantee that these houses will show us a “reward” in the VIP points room not too long from now, because LEGO will have to “dump them” after getting stuck with them… Not even the new Modular will get you this “gift” either, and the new modular might not be worth its money really either.
It’s a pity that LEGO is becoming more greedy everyday;… keep pushing it LEGO and wait until people massively stop buying your products altogether,… again !…
That threshold is ridiculous, for what is a nice but nothing special set. And to think this is the first of four “Houses of the World” sets.
Seems excessive for a very vanilla GWP – this one will play straight into the hands of speculators and flippers. I struggled with justifying Blacktron at $A309, but this is just gouging. Guess I won’t be collecting these then – my guess is that very few will find their way into the collections of fans.
I few years ago Lego publicly said they would work to reduce the “limited edition” releases, so that all sets could be made readily available to all fans. This flies directly in the face of that, I feel.
It would be better value to buy the sets discounted elsewhere and bricklink the parts. That doesn’t seem to factor into LEGO’s thinking here. Really stinks of being greedy. They’re in danger of becoming like Hasbro.
You can already buy sets came out this year from other store for discounted price. If I were to buy $400AUD off Lego store, I can buy the same at say Kmart. The saving I would have got is enough for me to buy 2 small sets of my choice. I really do not understand their mentality in setting these threshold.
It is not as though 40583 is such a compelling GWP anyway. I note that the Lego site stated value is US$19.99 and AUD$29.99 which is only 7.5%-8% of the required spend. You would be better off with double VIP points.
I suspect that Lego will have a lot of stock left over. I wonder what they will do with the it.
I guess these will become ultra collectible (like 40579 Eiffel’s Apartment)
Why is this written like this how much the set costs? You are literally getting it free with the $250 US worth of stuff you are buying.
I don’t think it is, I read this comment as just to be an evaluation of how valuable (or in this case, not valuable) the GWP is relative to the threshold for spend. And I see the point. The Forest Hideout set last year had a listed value of USD 24.99 but only required USD 150 spend, and the Blacktron set had a listed value of USD 29.99 and required USD 190 spend. In both of those cases the ratio of GWP to spend required is much more favorable than here (not to mention those GWPs were probably much cooler in the minds of most AFOLs).
Agree, ridiculous price point. Just too high . Not buying as I dont want to encourage them.