2016 was a huge year for Bricking Around. In terms of raw numbers there were over 700,000 views from more 200,000 visitors. That is a significant increase over 2015.
I published over 280 articles during 2016. Across those articles there were 691 comments. That figure doesn’t include any Facebook comments or tweets.
Top Stories
The top individual article was the 2016 Toy Sale deals from Big W. Big W has always been a popular retailer and with a disappointing offering from Target this year it makes sense there was a lot of interest in what Big W were offering.
Second place was actually a 2015 article about LEGO Dimensions PDF instructions; clearly the popularity of the game saw lots of people looking for how to build the expansion packs.
There also seems to be a lot of interest in the Dreamworld LEGO store, with that announcement being the third most read article of the year. There should be plenty of interest when it opens.
Links
The outbound traffic on the site always gives an interesting insight into what people are interested in checking out further.
Unsurprisingly the Australian online LEGO store was the top link; it’s still your only source for a lot of exclusives and their bonus offers can be tempting.
Second place this year was taken by eBay. The combination of retailer offers stacking with eBay offers for impressive discounts explains this one. There was more than one opportunity to get 28% off via eBay in 2016.
Third place was Myer, beating out all of the other retailers.
A year of sales
I’ve done up what I hope is an interesting visual to show just how many sales there were during 2016. This sales heatmap comes from the sales data that was posted here during the year, so it doesn’t include every sale from every retailer as there were possibly some that I missed. You can click on the picture for a larger version.
Looking at the diagram shows that despite the big toy sales taking place in July it was April that had the first bulk lot of sales for the year. This year there was also a heap of sales right before Christmas. The sales marked on the image are a mix of selected set and standard percentage off deals.
According to my data there were 18 days in 2016 were there was no LEGO on sale. That number may actually be less as a few of them are in August; not long after my first child was born. It’s certainly possible I was distracted and missed a sale or two. Even still, just 18 days without some sort of LEGO sale. It goes to show that buying LEGO in Australia isn’t all bad.
On to 2017…
I’ve got big plans for 2017. I have been a bit slack in my event coverage, and I’d love to be better at covering these and making sure people get out to see their local shows.
I am also aiming to launch a new “Buy LEGO” page. I don’t want to give away too much just yet but I hope the new page will be a valuable tool for all LEGO buyers.
I also have a few secret projects that may or may not eventuate, so I don’t want to give anything away.
Of course all the regular LEGO coverage you come for will be here.
This is one of the few websites I visit on a daily basis. Thanks and keep up the great work.
A great year. Keep up the good work.
Thanks, Michael. You’re a champion!
Thanks for your hard work. I check your page out daily as well.
Thank you for Bricking Around! This is one of my daily visit sites as well!
Woo Hoo…only 18 days without a Lego sale that may explain my sad bank balance. This is an awesome blog and quite literally the only one I check in with daily. Thanks for your hard work in bringing the info and insight into Lego.