This- this right here, it's not a LEGO.
but I dare you to tell the difference.
This is actually a replica
of a Kiddicraft self-locking building brick
and it snaps together just like
that.
Kiddicraft earned these patents for bricks, cafes and cranes
and fire stations.
So why is LEGO the name you know for plastic bricks?
“LEGO is here.” The story only makes sense if you learn about
a forgotten technological breakthrough and a marketing epiphany
that will help explain once and for all
why LEGO won.
This is an N.
Supposed to be an N. Okay.
LEGO’s hard.
Don't judge me.
I'm going to give you some background here.
I'm not an adult fan of LEGO.
I'm a new fan of LEGO.
I didn't really have these
when I was a kid, but I got some for my son and I started wondering,
why are these so good at what they do
and how did LEGO become LEGO?
And then I learned about Kiddicraft.
In the 1940s, an English toymaker named Hilary Page ran Kiddicraft.
It produced a lot of stuff, but its toys included Self-locking
building blocks that look shockingly like LEGO bricks.
Kiddicraft blocks encouraged creative design from plastic,
like this man and woman.
As early as 1939, Page patented a version
of interlocking blocks that just snapped into place.
That was actually pretty new at the time.
Even LEGO built its toys out of wood,
but they quickly followed the Kiddicraft template.
You can see that here.
In fact, the connection — it was not a coincidence.
The first LEGO plastic mold was the same one that Kiddicraft used,
and early LEGO bricks were almost identical
to Kiddicraft blocks, with a few minor differences.
They slightly changed the scale and the studs,
but as you can see, they were pretty similar early Kiddicraft
blocks had little slots in the side for windows and other attachments.
So did early LEGO bricks from top to bottom.
These were very similar to Kiddicraft blocks.
So with such a simple idea that it kind of already been done.
How did LEGO win?
It gets headlined as LEGO stole the idea from Kiddicraft?
But to find the truth...now that I have my little LEGO examination
studio set up, you need to turn the Kiddicraft block upside down
to see some of its problems.
It's hollow on the inside.
Now look at a LEGO today.
Do you see the difference?
The design of the early Kiddicraft
brick and LEGO brick had some problems.
These slots in the side, they weren't just for windows.
They helped the brick flex so that it could snap into place.
That compensated for mediocre manufacturing, the bottom
being an empty box.
Well, that was actually a big negative.
That means the Kiddicraft blocks simply didn't grip all that
well and they could work without reinforcement.
LEGO made tweaks from the beginning, changing the scale and studs slightly.
They got rid of the side slots in 1954, but in the mid-to-late 1950s
they also added a key innovation to use in the center.
LEGO says that these
tubes are the reason LEGOs have such good “clutch power.”
It gives the studs more points of contact
than just the edges of the block.
So even if LEGO did imitate Kiddicraft’s
initial design in the 1950s, they changed it
in crucial ways that make LEGO bricks so much better.
This gave LEGO a patent to protect its product
and a real innovation that led the company forward.
Now, I think that marketing can totally be overrated,
but I think that the way that LEGO thought about their product in the 1950s,
it was a key differentiator.
Folks, it's about to get “Mad Men” in here.
“So have you figured out a way to work the wheel into it?
We know it's hard because wheels aren't really seen as exciting technology,
even though they are the original.” LEGO.
It's a shortening of two Danish words.
But the appeal is international.
Under
the leadership of Gottfried Kurt Christiansen,
they changed priorities in the 1950s.
Kiddicraft always had a bunch of toys like these pyramid rings
and distractions like these miniatures.
Ultimately bankrupted the company.
But LEGO
was able to focus
automatic binding bricks became
LEGO bricks, LEGO Mursten,
and it was understood as a LEGO system.
Instead of building a portfolio of different disconnected
toys, Christiansen built something that worked together
like a town.
The town made LEGO a place for people
and bricks to work together toward a common goal.
The goal of creation.
Christiansen developed six rules of play:
limited in size
without setting limitations for imagination; affordable;
simple, durable and offering
rich variations; for girls, for boys,
for every age; a classic
among toys without the need of renewal;
and easy to distribute.
Those innovations quickly became institutional.
An in-house group called LEGO Futura created something new.
They called it
the wheel.
LEGO, they’re shortened from the Danish.
It means “play well.”
These two things together— bold engineering and platform
marketing— they were breakthroughs.
“Hey, kids, look
a whole new world to build.” But I have a question for you.
Which one was more important?
Was it more important that LEGO built a system of play
or that it tweaked the blocks until they were perfect?
I think without the engineering, without the tubes,
you don't have the same company.
The quest to re-imagine LEGO bricks from a Kiddicraft
clone to something new and way, way better.
That is what makes LEGO....LEGO.
You can see the influences of both approaches in the company.
Today, the current CEO has refocused the company
by reminding everybody that they are all about selling bricks.
They make it clear that LEGO still cares about its platform,
and that's why LEGO won, not because it got lucky or strong
armed the competition, or took an idea from Kiddicraft.
They won because they never stopped building.
All right.
Thank you for watching.
This video really is inspired by me checking out
my son's LEGO set and being like, wow, these things are awesome.
Why are they so good at what they do?
And I loved getting to find out the answer.
If you haven't been here before, this is a personal channel where I post
personal videos,
history videos, stuff like that, a couple of shout outs I want to do.
First, go to your local library and print out your own replica Kiddicraft block.
I've got a link to that model in the description.
Secondly, I also have a link in the description and floating around my head
somewhere here to the Patreon commentary, or reaction video, to this video.
Every time I post a little more info and all the research
that I had to leave out because I didn't have time.
And so it's been kind of fun seeing that community build.
I also occasionally post behind the scenes pictures and info and stuff like that,
so it's been kind of fun
to learn how that works and it'd be cool to see you there too.
Otherwise that's it for this one and hopefully I will see you in the next one.
In the meantime, have fun and keep keep building.
All right. Bye.