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Updated: 9:59 PM Dec 12, 2010
Love of Legos not lost on local business
One local retailer has taken the universal love for Legos and turned it into a business. The store is called E–Bricks. It was started by Kenneth Riskey three years ago. At first it only shipped lego parts around the world but just this year they've expanded the store to give buyers that hands-on Lego experience.
Posted: 7:16 PM Dec 12, 2010Reporter: Aaron Luna Email Address: aaron.luna@nbc11news.com |
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Grand Junction, Colo (KKCO)-Zach Edmands and his friend Felicia scour through thousands of Legos looking for the perfect piece. "I like to do the makeshift spaceships with the Legos," says, Edmands. Felicia prefers the larger scale projects. And with millions of pieces to choose from there’s nothing these two can’t make. Edmands says, "You can do anything with them, like, you can make 'em into a spaceship you can make it into a house you can make it into a giant truck."
Store owner Kenneth Riskey started out just selling old Lego sets but finding replacement parts turned out to be a business in itself. "We have 5.5 million parts in house and pretty much every Lego piece that you could ever imagine," says Riskey. Buying straight from Lego, or buying used sets found around town, Riskey then sorts the parts and before shipping them around the world. He stores all in his part in row upon row of small shelving units, each labeled with numbers across the top and down the side. Riskey gives an example of how it works. "François Heimlich Maneuver from, I don't know, Virginia, orders a bunch of these, our software will tell us they're in 124X3 and we'll go in and pull 10 or however many he ordered," he says.
But these Legos are not just going to kids. Sculptor order large amounts of pieces as do the AFOLs, or adult fans of Legos, as they’re called. Demand for certain pieces or characters have even generated a sort of collectors market. Riskey says, "It's almost a cult following."
Just this year Riskey opened the front of his store to retail sales, offering everything from the most popular sets to individual blocks. With more than 22,000 different Lego molds, builders can get as technical or as simple as they’d like and the combinations are endless.
Edmands says, "They never get old."
E–Bricks is located on 1st street just north of Grand. They also host birthday parties where kids can build and then take home their own Lego creations.
If you have a business you'd like to see featured on our 11cares for business you can email me at AARON.LUNA@NBC11NEWS.COM
