Brick by Brick

Starred review from April 29, 2013
LEGO’s iconic building system is a favorite of children and parents worldwide. Wharton professor Robertson’s entertaining, informative, and fast-paced account of LEGO’s rise, fall, and subsequent victory in the marketplace will have readers rooting for the survival of the little brick. Writing with former Fast Company senior editor Breen (The Responsibility Revolution), Robertson recounts how in 1932, founder Ole Kirk Christiansen, a Danish master carpenter and toymaker, spent more than a decade perfecting the plastic brick; how his son Godtfred “bet on the brick” in the mid-1950s and developed play systems that propelled the company’s expansion through the next several decades; and how grandson Kjeld drove global growth from the 1970s to the early 2000s. The majority of the book examines the company’s precarious health over the last decade. A turnaround operator’s attempted innovation backfires and leaves the company’s balance sheet bleeding beyond repair. In the end, a new CFO and CEO take draconian measures to repair the company, focusing on “profitable innovation”—rather than innovation for innovation’s sake—and listening to the customer. This book will be a valuable read for any business leader or student, but will also delight those familiar with the beloved toy. 37 b&w photos, 8-page insert. Agent: Carol Franco, Kneerim, Williams & Bloom.

June 1, 2013
How LEGO, the closely held, family-owned Danish toymaker, rose to world leadership in its business class, flirted with bankruptcy collapse and recovered to stake its claim to global leadership once again. Wharton School professor Robertson (co-author: Enterprise Architecture as Strategy: Creating a Foundation for Business Execution, 2006) and Fast Company founding member Breen (co-author: The Responsibility Revolution: How the Next Generation of Businesses Will Win, 2010, etc.) map the history of the company in relation to the principles that currently underlie business thinking about how to organize innovation successfully for the long haul. Founded in 1932 by master carpenter Ole Kirk Christiansen in Billund--where its world headquarters and manufacturing facilities are still located--he company's name is a play on the Danish leg godt, which means "play well." Christiansen's son, Godtfred, bought their first plastic-injection molding machine in 1947 and developed an "Automatic Binding Brick" by 1951. It was not until 1958, however, after years of experimentation, that they hit on the small hollow brick and its distinctive "clutch power" when the bricks are snapped together, that the company was propelled to world success. The authors show how chasing short-term popular trends in the 1990s alienated the customer base and sapped revenues, but LEGO recovered stronger than before, as their now-grown-up customer base stepped forward and helped transform the company's world position with the volunteered designs and criticisms that went into successful products like the LEGO Mindstorms NXT robot. Turning back to their traditional base with things like Henrik Andersen's 2004 design for a LEGO fire truck and products like LEGO Architect, also helped. A lively account of a company whose products will be familiar to most readers.

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