LEGO – the Story of Ole Kirk Christiansen's Success

One of Ole Kirk Kristiansen's most important collaborators was his son, Godtfred Kirk Christiansen, who plunged completely into toy production. By the age of sixteen he had already designed some new games and contributed to their manufacture, additionally he was responsible for keeping the accounts. The spelling difference in the surname - which in Godtfred's case is written with Ch, rather than K, as can be seen from his birth certificate - is due to a choice by Godtfred himself, who as an adult changed his spelling to Christiansen. The older brothers, Karl Georg and Johannes, had studied as carpenters, while the lastborn Gerhardt was a milkman. Ole Kirk, in fact, would have preferred to keep Godtfred by his side right from the start, but his son had insisted on following an apprenticeship, like his brothers. Not even Godtfred was very successful in toy production among his fellow students at the Craft School: while the other students wanted to learn how to build houses or work in mechanical industries and workshops, Godtfred designed new toy designs, which he then sent to his father in Billund.

One day came the news that the German Chancellor Adolf Hitler had invaded Poland, and that war had broken out in Europe. This, commercially, was very good news for the small factory in Billund: all of a sudden, the large toy manufacturers in Germany stopped operating, and LEGO could take a larger share of the market. In Billund, war or no war, production grew. Soon, however, the Germans also occupied Denmark, and reached Billund, where Hitler's troops demanded to stay at Kristiansen's house. It was one of those requests to which one could not really say no. One night in March 1942, the LEGO factory was destroyed by a fire, probably caused by a short circuit. Only the warehouse was saved, in addition to the family's private home. From one day to the next, production stopped. The insurance did not cover even half of the damage. The company was in danger. Together, Godtfred and Ole Kirk began to travel around Denmark in search of a new factory. But Ole Kirk was reluctant to move LEGO: he did not want to leave his many employees and their families in trouble. So, finally, he persuaded the bank to grant him a loan to build a new, larger plant in Billund.

By the end of the year the factory was ready, and production began again. The resumption of toy sales was surprisingly quick, certainly also thanks to the fact that at this point the German competitors were out of the game, and that after so many years of activity relations with sellers from all over Denmark had become established. In the year following the fire, forty employees worked at the Billund plant.

During the war, Godtfred married Edith Nørregaard Knudsen, daughter of Billund's grocer, who gave him three children: Gunhild, Kjeld and Hanne. When the war ended, it became difficult to get wood from Sweden, so Ole Kirk started looking for other raw materials to use for production. In 1947, a representative of Windsor - a British mechanical engineering company - came to Copenhagen to demonstrate a plastic processing machine. To explain the advantages of this new material to those present, he had carried in his pocket some plastic bricks produced by the English company Kiddicraft, which he presented as an opportunity for all potential customers. The bricks were developed by the Englishman Hilary Fisher Page, who founded the Kiddicraft toy factory in 1932. They were square, with protrusions on the upper face and recesses on the lower face, so that they could be mounted on top of each other much better than the old wooden bricks. They could be used, for example, to build a small house. They were available in different colors, bright colors, and had a smooth surface on which there was no accumulation of dirt, so they were easy to wash (the concept of hygiene, in the education of children, had become very popular). Fisher, who was a psychologist, had a very scientific approach to toy development. He visited the families and sat on the floor to play with the children, and in this way he came up with new toys. By 1938 he had gathered his ideas in a book, Playtime in the First Five Years , and had developed a long line of functional and durable products that had redefined the British toy market. These included plastic bricks, which he called interlocking building cubes and patented them in 1940.

The slogan that advertised his toys was "Sensible Toys". In 1947, at the annual Earls Court toy fair in London, Fisher and his family built a model of a skyscraper more than a metre high to demonstrate the potential of his bricks. Over the years, Fisher further developed the bricks by adding grooves on the sides, which offered more grip, so as to increase the grip of the mounted structure. He expanded the assortment, producing square and rectangular bricks, with four and eight protrusions on the top side. This improved product was patented in 1949 and sold in cardboard boxes with a drawn image of a child playing, so as to show how bricks were used. However, his efforts were not matched by a major commercial success in Great Britain. Ole Kirk bought a plastic processing machine because he was convinced that the new material offered many opportunities. The plant cost him SEK 30,000, which was 50 per cent more than the company's total profit in 1946. In other words, a very high-risk investment. Even though LEGO was now charging SEK 500,000 a year, there were many expenses and the cash balance was low. On a typical day in 1947, the company had a cash balance of SEK 6,000 and a red bank account of SEK 150,000. Godtfred was skeptical. That sum was very high, and no one could know if the plastic toys would be successful. What worried him was that his father had no interest in financial matters. Godtfred was so upset that he asked his most trusted employees to do everything they could to "curb Daddy" and his "nefarious urge to build, build, build". At the same time, Godtfred asked his accountant to calculate the cash balance every day, before closing time, so that he always knew exactly how much money there was. The purchase of the plastic processing machine turned out to be a very good investment. The company produced, among other things, a model of the Ferguson tractor, packaged in an assembly box. This new toy sold twenty thousand units in its first production, an absolute record for LEGO. Yet Godtfred was still not convinced about the future of plastic toys.

In 1949, in an interview for the Fyens Stiftstidende, he said: "You can make pretty and chic things with plastic, but the safest material is still wood”. Ole Kirk reflected at length on the plastic bricks offered by Windsor's man. Ole Kirk Kristiansen decided to start the production of a slightly modified version of the bricks: different thickness and flat protuberances, but otherwise identical to those of Kiddicraft. That same year, LEGO launched the so-called Automatic Binding Bricks, which at the time were known by their English name, on the market, selling them - just like Kiddicraft did - in a plastic box with illustrations explaining how to use them for construction.

The first plastic bricks marketed under the English name of Automatic Binding Bricks, 1951 However, just as in Great Britain, sales were slow. Toy dealers showed little or no interest in the new plastic bricks. But it was not a great deal of damage. On the contrary, the company was doing very well: LEGO's turnover now stood at SEK 1.2 million, and there were about eighty employees in the plant. More than 90 percent of the sales were made up of the good old wooden toys of the past.

LEGO Mursten

In June 1950, Ole Kirk Kristiansen appointed his 31-year-old son Godtfred as Deputy Director of the LEGO. He, on the other hand, retained the role of administrative director and president. The following year, Ole Kirk had a cerebral hemorrhage, from which he would never recover completely. He lost his energy, often felt unwell and was absent from work. In fact, Godtfred took over the full direction of LEGO. To make the product more Danish and understandable, he changed its name to LEGO Mursten ("LEGO bricks"), selling them in a box with a photograph of his sons Kjeld and Gunhild playing with plastic bricks. A very appropriate strategy, since Godtfred spent a lot of time playing with buildings with his children. The packaging was very similar to that of Kiddicraft.

But the product still didn't take off. Godtfred hired two sales representatives with the sole task of going around selling LEGO Mursten, explaining the potential of bricks to the shopkeepers. And so they did, but without success. Their poor results convinced Godtfred to use part of his time to try and sell them in person to retailers, and this allowed him to see for himself the importance of the way the packaging was displayed in shops and department stores. So he came up with the idea of presenting the buildings already assembled, so that the public could see what could be done with the bricks. In 1952, Ole Kirk Kristiansen suddenly intervened in the management, deciding that the Billund plants should be expanded again: he aimed to further increase production capacity. But liquidity was scarce, and according to Godtfred's calculations the investment was greater than LEGO could afford. "I said to Dad: "Let's start with a third of the sum". But shortly afterwards, he raised his head and said: "Here I decide what you build; you take care of finding the money! Godtfred, resentful, resigned, in protest at his father's decision.

Appointed Deputy Director in 1950, Godtfred changed the name of the Automatic Binding Bricks to LEGO Mursten. But his resignation did not last long. Back at LEGO, Godtfred went to Norway, where he had some contacts, and established production there for the Norwegian market. That foreign expansion was not planned, it was decided only in response to the need to sell more, so as to make cash and be able to afford the investment in new factories. This was the last major decision taken by Ole Kirk Kristiansen. In the years to come, the founder of LEGO would keep more and more to his side, weakened by other brain haemorrhages, one of which would then kill him, in 1958.

In June 1950, Ole Kirk Kristiansen appointed his 31-year-old son Godtfred as Deputy Director of the LEGO. He, on the other hand, retained the role of administrative director and president. The following year, Ole Kirk had a cerebral hemorrhage, from which he would never recover completely. He lost his energy, often felt unwell and was absent from work. In fact, Godtfred took over the full direction of LEGO. To make the product more Danish and understandable, he changed its name to LEGO Mursten ("LEGO bricks"), selling them in a box with a photograph of his sons Kjeld and Gunhild playing with plastic bricks. A very appropriate strategy, since Godtfred spent a lot of time playing with buildings with his children. The packaging was very similar to that of Kiddicraft.

But the product still didn't take off. Godtfred hired two sales representatives with the sole task of going around selling LEGO Mursten, explaining the potential of bricks to the shopkeepers. And so they did, but without success. Their poor results convinced Godtfred to use part of his time to try and sell them in person to retailers, and this allowed him to see for himself the importance of the way the packaging was displayed in shops and department stores. So he came up with the idea of presenting the buildings already assembled, so that the public could see what could be done with the bricks. In 1952, Ole Kirk Kristiansen suddenly intervened in the management, deciding that the Billund plants should be expanded again: he aimed to further increase production capacity. But liquidity was scarce, and according to Godtfred's calculations the investment was greater than LEGO could afford. "I said to Dad: "Let's start with a third of the sum". But shortly afterwards, he raised his head and said: "Here I decide what you build; you take care of finding the money! Godtfred, resentful, resigned, in protest at his father's decision.

Appointed Deputy Director in 1950, Godtfred changed the name of the Automatic Binding Bricks to LEGO Mursten. In the spring of 1954, Godtfred boarded a DFDS ship and went to a toy fair in London to find some inspiration. He was increasingly concerned about the future: sales were going well, and there were now 140 employees at LEGO's plant, but German manufacturers had come back with new products at low prices, thanks to mass production aimed at a much wider market. Before the war, German manufacturers covered 90% of the Danish toy market. At the same time, they continued to copy them, so that whatever new product LEGO developed, within a year the Germans launched an identical one on the market, but at a lower price, and often with a lower quality. Godtfred's concern was that if LEGO did not succeed in developing an international product which was difficult to copy and which lent itself to mass production, its competitors would sooner or later effectively drive it out of the market. During the crossing, Godtfred met Troels Petersen, who had just been appointed purchasing manager at the toy department of Magasin du Nord (a kind of Danish Rinascente). Petersen made some reflections about the assortment: "There is not a single toy that is based on a real idea or a well-thought-out concept," he said, then stating that there was "not a single product that was centered on a gaming system. That conversation prompted Godtfred to rethink what the ideal characteristics of a toy were for children all over the world. In the following months, he drew up a list of "LEGO requirements" that in his opinion the products of his company would have to present in order to have a future:

1. The toy must be small in size, without restricting the free expression of fantasy.
2. It must be affordable as far as the purchase price is concerned.
3. It must be simple, durable and at the same time offer a wide range of variations.
4. It should appeal to children of all ages and of both sexes.
5. It must be timeless, i.e. a classic, which does not require renewal.
6. It must be easy to ship.

Godtfred reviewed the LEGO product range, which included around two hundred products, and found that neither the Ferguson tractor, nor the doll houses, nor the plastic animals could be developed to meet these specific requirements. In fact, the only one who actually met them was LEGO Mursten. At that time, however, bricks accounted for only 5-10 percent of turnover. Godtfred therefore decided to find out how they could be developed. To this end, he gathered a small group of employees, who were working at his house evening after night, in an attempt to devise a concept of systematic play with plastic bricks. After almost a year of experimentation, they prepared a new assortment of bricks, which was launched under the name of LEGO System i Leg ("System in the Game"): twenty-eight different packages, eight cars, plus a series of other elements, to form an overall structure in the form of a city. To complete the work, a billboard to be laid out on the ground or on a table, on which children could place houses, trees, road signs and cars to be driven following the same traffic regulations decided by the Danish Road Safety Council. The novelty was received with suspicion by many toy dealers. The idea did not convince them. The largest retailer in the province, Holger Sørensen of Odense, said: "I don't believe in that stuff. These LEGO people are out of their minds. Nothing will ever come of it".

But instead, the idea appealed to both children and their parents. The sale of bricks soon took off, and Godtfred introduced new system models with more variation possibilities, while marketing increased significantly. Godtfred, unlike his father, was convinced that marketing was a decisive factor. Ole Kirk, on the other hand, was of the opinion that the products would sell themselves, as long as they were good enough. This certainty was probably dictated by the fact that Ole Kirk was more of a craftsman than a seller, and therefore focused mainly on the quality of the product.

Godtfred, on the other hand, firmly believed in the need to explain to the public all the possibilities of LEGO bricks and to get the message across to both children and their parents. That's why, in 1954, LEGO hired its first advertising manager, Henning Guld, who developed magazine advertising campaigns aimed at retailers.