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Lego brick
: According to Lego, there is no alternative to offering long-term alternatives to hard plastic
Photo: Karl-Josef Hildenbrand / dpa
They are colorful and angular, have nubs and tubes inside that provide stability.
Almost every child's room has been filled with it for 90 years.
Everyone knows them - the Lego building blocks.
The Danish company is one of the largest toy manufacturers in the world.
And among the most successful: Lego is the toy manufacturer with the highest turnover worldwide, followed by the US companies Hasbro and Mattel.
Lego employs more than 17,400 people in around 30 countries worldwide, around 440 of them in Germany.
In the last financial year, the family company made a profit of 1.3 billion euros with sales of around 7.4 billion euros.
This is the third record in a row.
But now the market leader has to reorient itself.
In times of climate change, the classic Lego brick made of plastic no longer has a future.
Although Lego has been making bendable parts - such as minifigures, accessories or plant elements - from sugar cane for four years, there is still no alternative on the market for the famous bricks.
The group wants to invest 400 million euros to find a replacement for the stones made of petroleum-based plastic by 2030.
To this end, research is currently being carried out into plant fibers such as corn, wheat and cellulose.
Last year, Lego presented a prototype made from recycled PET bottles.
"The prototype is the result of three years of intensive work testing over 250 different PET materials," says Lego environmental expert
Tim Brooks
.
But this must now be tested and optimized for at least another year before production can start.
The developers are still working on the color design, because the colors appear a little paler on the Lego bricks made from the new materials.
The pressure from outside is not only great for the stone: Lego is receiving criticism because the toy is packaged in disposable plastic.
That too should change.
By 2025, the group wants to only offer packaging made of paper.
The Danes are currently building their first climate-neutral factory in Vietnam.
Way back to sustainability
The road to sustainability is long – or rather back there.
Exactly 90 years ago, Lego started with a sustainable basic building block made of wood.
Master carpenter
Ole Kirk Kristiansen
was the first to make toys that could be put together from leftover wood.
26 years later, his son
Godtfred Kirk Kristiansen
patented the stone we know today.
There are now over 18,000 products.
"The invention of the plastic Lego building block alone made the company so successful - otherwise Lego would not have become nearly as well known," says
Christine Spiller
, director of the German Toy Museum.
As a wooden toy manufacturer, Lego was just one of many manufacturers.
Competitors Hasbro and Mattel also want to replace plastic, Playmobil is pushing ahead
Lego is still one of many manufacturers today: one of many who are looking for the path to sustainability.
Like Lego, toy
giant Mattel
wants to switch to sustainable materials by 2030.
Then the toys and packaging should only consist of recycled, reusable or bio-based plastics.
As a first step, Mattel is launching building blocks made from sustainable raw materials.
And
Hasbro
also has a concept: The "Monopoly" manufacturer wants to do without plastics in all new packaging by the end of 2022.
Then the products will follow.
A look at Germany shows that the three toy giants are not the first to tackle a sustainability strategy.
Playmobil is already in the fast lane.
The company offers products that consist of around 80 percent recycled and sustainable plastics.
The Horst Brandstätter group of companies, to which Playmobil belongs, wants to be climate-neutral and avoid emissions by 2027.
The company intends to invest around 50 million euros in climate protection in the coming years.
Lego competitor Open Brick Source already sells wooden clamping blocks.
Managing Director
Stefan Reißner
is also working on a concept to bring clamping blocks made of other more environmentally friendly materials onto the market.
The race for sustainable toys will pick up speed in the coming years.
If you take your time with this topic, you risk losing sales to the competition.
But what happens if the Lego bricks made from new material are not so well received by customers?
"Then we'll keep looking, there's no alternative," says Lego environmental expert Tim Brooks.
The problem: "The properties of plastic are outstanding for manufacturers. They are extremely difficult to replace," says
Gerda Schwab
, spokeswoman for the German Association of the Toy Industry.
Nevertheless, a sustainable replacement is imperative, since customer demand for sustainable materials is also increasing.
This does not only apply to Lego: the search goes on.