3 ms·

Way to do millions of dollars in PR damage over 200k. As this story spreads people will just assume the whole chain is bad. The bigger story is an elderly man

Way to do millions of dollars in PR damage over 200k. As this story spreads people will just assume the whole chain is bad. The bigger story is an elderly man needing to sell his toys to pay for cancer treatment. We could give all people free cancer treatment, but defense contractors need money.

ChrisRR 5mo ago
I totally don't get it. If I were the head of corporate I would've just given them the sets back to avoid all of the backlash.
- mcv 5mo ago
  But you're not. The head of corporate is someone who thought he could get away with this. And almost did, until Reckless Ben showed up.
  - _zoltan_ 5mo ago
    but ... they did get away with it? based on the blog post, it ends with the store closure? (which I don't understand why)
    - gwd 5mo ago
      If you search for "Bricks and minifigs", every result apart from their main website is about this controversy. One of the values of a franchise is the branding; at least for the forseeable future, this will be a negative value. For a company that serves a small niche community, this seems like suicide.
    - mcv 5mo ago
      It seems they closed the store rather than give back the lego. That seems like a win of sorts, because I'm sure it hurts B&M to some degree, but it's not getting the stolen lego back. I've now also seen part 2, in which the amount of police harassment that B&M seems to be able to bring to bear is absolutely disgusting.
    - wgjordan 5mo ago
      [dead]
Schmerika 5mo ago
> people will just assume the whole chain is bad. The whole chain is bad. We're far past the point where the company bigwigs should have fixed this. It's not like they don't know. > The bigger story is an elderly man needing to sell his toys to pay for cancer treatment. Idk. Straight up corporate theft of $200k, backed up by the cops, is a more visceral story than 'yet another person merked by our predatory healthcare system'. > We could give all people free cancer treatment, but defense contractors need money. Yes, and that's important - but there are unique aspects to this story which shouldn't be overshadowed by the higher priority problem for the nation. The immediate problem for this elderly cancer patient isn't going to be solved by Americans suddenly realising that they have people power - but getting his Legos back might save his life.
- rithdmc 5mo ago
  I think it's more visceral, but a smaller story. 'yet another person merked by our predatory healthcare system' is a headline that will be relevant again, with new participants, tomorrow, or next week. This headline about star wars lego? Less so.
  - Schmerika 5mo ago
    > a smaller story Sure. Any one person's story will be smaller than the whole picture - is that your whole point? What are you proposing - that we ignore stories like this until we fix healthcare? Because if that's not what you're saying, why bring it up as if one cancer patient's life and property rights aren't important (even beyond tomorrow and next week)? > 'yet another person merked by our predatory healthcare system' is a headline that will be relevant again, with new participants, tomorrow, or next week. And so will corporate theft, and bureaucratic Kafkaesque nightmares, and police corruption, etc. There's no lack of overlapping evil to look at here. Individual stories are still important and relevant, and ignoring them to look at the bigger picture is like ignoring water to look at the ocean.
    - rithdmc 5mo ago
      > is that your whole point? What are you proposing - that we ignore stories like this until we fix healthcare? IMO that's a pretty antagonistic read of my comment. GP said 'bigger story', you said 'visceral story'. In no way do I read myself or the GP dismissing the B&M story - quite the opposite, as GP says, noting "millions of dollars in PR damage" doesn't sound like ignoring something. The second half of my comment was criticizing the news cycle, and its preference for unique headlines.

ChrisRR 5mo ago

I totally don't get it. If I were the head of corporate I would've just given them the sets back to avoid all of the backlash.

mcv 5mo ago
But you're not. The head of corporate is someone who thought he could get away with this. And almost did, until Reckless Ben showed up.
- _zoltan_ 5mo ago
  but ... they did get away with it? based on the blog post, it ends with the store closure? (which I don't understand why)
  - gwd 5mo ago
    If you search for "Bricks and minifigs", every result apart from their main website is about this controversy. One of the values of a franchise is the branding; at least for the forseeable future, this will be a negative value. For a company that serves a small niche community, this seems like suicide.
  - mcv 5mo ago
    It seems they closed the store rather than give back the lego. That seems like a win of sorts, because I'm sure it hurts B&M to some degree, but it's not getting the stolen lego back. I've now also seen part 2, in which the amount of police harassment that B&M seems to be able to bring to bear is absolutely disgusting.
  - wgjordan 5mo ago
    [dead]

Schmerika 5mo ago

> people will just assume the whole chain is bad. The whole chain is bad. We're far past the point where the company bigwigs should have fixed this. It's not like they don't know. > The bigger story is an elderly man needing to sell his toys to pay for cancer treatment. Idk. Straight up corporate theft of $200k, backed up by the cops, is a more visceral story than 'yet another person merked by our predatory healthcare system'. > We could give all people free cancer treatment, but defense contractors need money. Yes, and that's important - but there are unique aspects to this story which shouldn't be overshadowed by the higher priority problem for the nation. The immediate problem for this elderly cancer patient isn't going to be solved by Americans suddenly realising that they have people power - but getting his Legos back might save his life.

rithdmc 5mo ago
I think it's more visceral, but a smaller story. 'yet another person merked by our predatory healthcare system' is a headline that will be relevant again, with new participants, tomorrow, or next week. This headline about star wars lego? Less so.
- Schmerika 5mo ago
  > a smaller story Sure. Any one person's story will be smaller than the whole picture - is that your whole point? What are you proposing - that we ignore stories like this until we fix healthcare? Because if that's not what you're saying, why bring it up as if one cancer patient's life and property rights aren't important (even beyond tomorrow and next week)? > 'yet another person merked by our predatory healthcare system' is a headline that will be relevant again, with new participants, tomorrow, or next week. And so will corporate theft, and bureaucratic Kafkaesque nightmares, and police corruption, etc. There's no lack of overlapping evil to look at here. Individual stories are still important and relevant, and ignoring them to look at the bigger picture is like ignoring water to look at the ocean.
  - rithdmc 5mo ago
    > is that your whole point? What are you proposing - that we ignore stories like this until we fix healthcare? IMO that's a pretty antagonistic read of my comment. GP said 'bigger story', you said 'visceral story'. In no way do I read myself or the GP dismissing the B&M story - quite the opposite, as GP says, noting "millions of dollars in PR damage" doesn't sound like ignoring something. The second half of my comment was criticizing the news cycle, and its preference for unique headlines.