I guess this is another piece of sad news, but something that we need to accept eventually. The LEGO Group (TLG) has announced that due to the global menace brought about by COVID-19, all of their LEGO Brand Stores will remain closed until April 12 or until further notice. This applies to all of its directly supervised and owned 154 global brand stores, much of it located in the US.
The announcement came in as a response to the updated directives given by the international community on a coordinated response against the COVID-19 threat. If you recall, LEGO initially said that it will close all of its 153 LEGO Brand Stores until March 27 as part of its compliance with government regulations. However, the company deemed it necessary to extend the said closure until April 12 or until further notice dependent on the local government’s instructions. Here’s the official update from LEGO:
An open letter from Niels B Christiansen, CEO, The LEGO Group
Updated March 27, 2020
To continue to protect the health of our communities, the LEGO® Brand Retail stores we own and operate will remain temporarily closed until at least April 12, possibly longer depending on government guidance. In locations where government restrictions aren’t currently in place, selected LEGO stores owned and operated by our partners will remain open. Those stores are taking all the necessary precautions and monitoring the situation closely.
This notice only applies to 150+ brand stores that LEGO owned and supervised, not including the LEGO certified stores. However, it still depends on the local government where the store is located, if the latter will allow continuous store operations.
It’s quite disheartening, especially to those who are looking forward to seeing the recently announced LEGO Ideas Pirates of Barracuda Bay (21322) up close and personal on April 1. Though TLG did not mention it specifically, we can expect that LEGO Shop@Home will continue to be operational but it will be realistic to expect major downtimes in terms of delivery due to the high volume of orders.
As of this posting, the US has now surpassed China for the highest number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in the world. That’s not a pretty picture to look at, and let’s continue to hope that all of these will eventually pass. Stay safe everyone and keep on building!
