I see people complaining all the time about LEGO producing many new sets with a lot of stickers, instead of printed parts. I think at this point in time everybody knows why LEGO makes stickers instead of always printing on pieces. If you don't know, it's basically about cost. Pieces that are printed are typically pieces of the same shapes. If there is a new piece, that hasn't been printed on before, it requires a lot of up front cost to make the machinery to print on the new shaped part, which results in increased cost of a set. Thus printing stickers is much more cost effective and keeps the price of the set down. But the question at hand is... to sticker, or not to sticker your pieces?
Let's break this question down into what I feel are the four major types of people who own LEGO bricks: Kids, Collectors, Brickers (or Parters, still working on this name) and MOC-ers.
Kids: As little and big kids all agree on, you open the box, dump out the parts, pull out the instructions and build. When a sticker needs to be applied, you either attempt it yourself or make someone else put the sticker on for you. Why? Because the instructions tell us to and the end result makes the set look so cool once it's built! Then you take it apart and build something else with the parts. If the stickers look strange on your new build, who cares? I just built a bad@ss spaceship from a country cottage. Verdict: Who cares, let's build something.
Collectors: Oh how this bunch loves to criticize what LEGO is doing right, or wrong. Stickers are the bane of every good set. Why? Because stickers can be a pain in the @ss to apply to a piece. It's already bad enough that the Collector has opened the box, (decreasing the sets resale value!), but now if the stickers aren't applied correctly (ex. placed crooked, fingerprints or air bubbles) , the set doesn't look right. If you don't apply the stickers, the set still doesn't look right. Oh the O.C.D. that this must cause. Collectors enjoy building and letting the work of art shine in all its glory up on a shelf, like any great piece of art should. Printed parts would simply make Collectors happy. Verdict: Sign petition to ban LEGO from making sets with stickers.
(On a side note, Collectors piecing together retired sets often look at the a printed piece as the Holy Grail to finishing a set. Especially the sets from the early 80's. The printing on many of those pieces have not survived the test of time. Oddly, the stickers seem to be holding up pretty good on the sets from the last couple decades. As long as they aren't crooked, have fingerprints or air bubbles. :P )
Brickers: Buy a set, (or 10 or 50), dump out the parts, sort them and list them for sale. Printed parts get a different part number than non-printed parts. Parts that are printed have greater value as they are rarer than the non-printed parts. No need to sticker the new parts. The sticker sheet itself is just another part to be sold. Buy some bulk loads of gently used LEGO bricks? Parts with stickers just get sold with their non-printed brothers and sisters. Some Brickers will list the sticker parts seperate, but the value isn't worth the time and effort. Odds are the sticker is placed crooked, has fingerprints or air bubbles. Verdict: Who cares? The parts sell either way.
MOC-ers: Of all the groups I feel MOC-ers want both printed parts and stickers. Lets face it, some of the printed pieces, or stickers pieces, are so cool! They often bring just the right touch to a MOC. Sometime, a MOC is built completely with the printed/sticker piece as the focal point. But on the other hand, when your MOC needs a quantity of 200 pieces of Plate W.Bow 2x2x2/3 in Bright Orange and all you can find are the ones with Arctic Explorer logo on them, wouldn't you really have prefered that they had been stickers instead of printed? Verdict: Depends on the day.
So... to sticker or not to sticker? There really is no right or wrong answer. Each individual has the right to place the sticker were the instructions tell us to place it, leave it on the sticker sheet, or stick it on your forehead. It doesn't matter, as long as you enjoy your bricks.
Now stop reading and go build something with LEGO bricks!
