What's that saying again? Oh, right: 'Find something you love to do and you'll never work a day in your life'. Basically, that means if you turn your passion or hobby into your career, then it won't feel like work at all, but something fun you get to do and still get paid. It's the ultimate dream, and here at Lightailing we're living it! But now we want to share with you some ways you can take your love of LEGO and turn it into a profitable business for yourself.
We'll cover everything from how to make money selling LEGOs, how to get paid to build LEGO sets, and all the nuances of selling LEGO instructions to others. So, if you want to turn this LEGO passion of yours into a business like we've done, then stick around because some of the different ways to make money with LEGO below might inspire you!
1. Become A Social Media Influencer (YouTube, Instagram, etc.)
OK, so becoming a social media influencer might sound like a far-fetched idea, but do you know how every single YouTuber or Instagrammer started out their careers? With a passion and a phone to record themselves or take pictures, and that's literally it. So why can't you do the same thing with LEGO and eventually turn it into a career?
It won't be easy and it'll require you to be creative, coming up with new content ideas constantly and reaching out to your fan base to make yourself more discoverable, and therefore more of an influencer.
But once you have your niche of people who enjoy watching your LEGO reviews, unboxing videos, and 'build with me' style vlogs, you'll be able to make a lot of money from it. No, don't quit your day job right away if you have dependents or bills to pay, but starting out making LEGO content online as a side hustle may one day become your full-time career!
People also read: Best LEGO YouTube Channels For You
2. LEGO-Inspired Merchandise
For this, you'll have to get really creative, but the key here is LEGO-inspired. You can't make anything that LEGO makes and try to undercut them in their market because even if you manage to make money this way, their lawyers will catch up to you eventually and you'll lose more in fines than you'll ever make.
However, LEGO-inspired merchandise is fair game. Think about all the 'I Love LEGO', 'LEGO Lady', or whatever other LEGO -related slogan merchandise there is out there. T-shirts, pencil cases, mugs, keyrings, makeup bags - you name it - there are LEGO-inspired merchandise all over the internet and you can make a lot of money through it.
Nowadays, you can easily set up an ecommerce website. What you should pay attention to would be how to drive traffic to your online store. Anyway, it worths give it a try.
Just make sure you toe the legal line, have creative ideas others will want to buy, and set a fair price point for what you're selling and you can make some great money this way!
3. Write Blogs About LEGO
People across the country are being paid for their words, and what do you need to do it? It's simple! Talk about your passion online in a blog and one day it might become your main source of income. You get paid for advertisements and affiliate marketing and all sorts of interesting ways to monetize your blog - but you don't need to worry about any of that yet. Those opportunities will come, for now, just concentrate on the content.
Once your LEGO blog has built enough of a regular audience, you'll be able to focus on the making money part. In the early stages, though, just concentrate on having fun and making content about the LEGO sets, minifigures, and MOCs that interest you most. Focus on LEGO news, stay up to date with upcoming releases and make your blog THE place to be for LEGO information. Once you've done that, the rest will fall into place.
4. Conduct LEGO Building Classes
This might seem crazy, because surely everybody knows how to build LEGO, right? Wrong, actually. Just because those of us who love LEGO are comfortable putting different bricks together to create something unique, it doesn't mean a lot of people are. In fact, if you're the sort of person who creates MOCs all the time, then conducting LEGO building classes for people who don't do it can be really profitable.
Start small. Maybe get some friends or family involved or reach out to your local community to practise lessons to make sure people are getting something out of the classes you teach. Eventually, you can take your lessons online and reach hundreds, if not thousands, of people at a time. The point is, if you're able to understand how to put LEGO together in an interesting way, then your skills are valuable, and as everybody knows, valuable skills can be monetized.
5. Sell Your Old LEGO
Selling your old LEGO is a no-brainer. This isn't something that you can turn into a full-time career because you'll eventually run out of 'stock', but as a great short-term way to make significant money, this works brilliantly.
Think about it. If you've been collecting LEGO for years, then the likelihood is you'll have sets in your collection that have been discontinued.
The beauty of this? What people can't have, they often want, so you can sell these old sets you likely no longer have on display to others who desperately want it for some significant money.
6. Sell Your Minifigures
Speaking of selling your old LEGO, you can also sell your old minifigures too. Again, those that aren't available anymore will fetch a higher price and you can make a lot of money quickly by selling your old LEGO sets and minifigures online in places like Facebook marketplace, eBay, or other specialized LEGO websites (like BrickLink or Brick Owl) or forums.
After you've made your money, though, you might be wondering how you can turn this into a sustainable career. Well, you can invest the money back into a LEGO business where you buy used sets from discount stores, charity shops, or online, and then clean them up and sell them on to others for a higher price.
The margins might not be huge, but if you were passionate about it and built a name for yourself in the used LEGO world, then you could definitely sell old LEGO and minifigures for a living!
7. Sell MOC Ideas On Rebrickable
Similar to the way you might conduct LEGO building classes, you could also sell MOC ideas on Rebrickable. That's right, selling LEGO instructions online is something a lot of people do as a career, and it all comes back to your skills as a MOC builder being valuable to those who don't think about builds in the same way you do.
Because you're able to create something unique, you can sell people the key to do it themselves, and they can sometimes sell for decent money if you build something lots of people will love.
Check out Rebrickable's Premium MOC selling guide for more information about this way of making money with LEGO, but trust us, it could be a bright new career for you if you're creative enough!
8. Speculating In LEGO
Speculating in LEGO is much like selling your old LEGO, except these aren't technically second hand. What you would do to make money here is invest a lot of money right now in a brand new set that you're sure will sell well in the future. For example, big flagship sets like those from Star Wars, Harry Potter, etc. Buy as many of the new set as you can afford, and then just don't touch them.
Here, the idea is that you store them until such a time that the set is discontinued and interest in the set is reignited again. Because you'll have an extensive selection of pristine, unopened sets, you'll be able to sell them on eBay or BrickLink or Brick Owl for a substantial profit.
This is more of a long-term way of making money with LEGO, but if you have the patience and the extra funds right now to buy some new sets (better yet, you could even buy some of the newer sets when they go on sale before being discontinued), you'll be able to make A LOT of money later on! And speculating in LEGO is more valuable than stocks when you pick the right sets to store...
Support Others
Before we leave you, we just wanted to leave a quick note about supporting others. If you're trying to make a living with LEGO, then look into others who are doing the same thing and support them.
YouTubers need likes, those selling LEGO merchandise, classes, or sets need exposure, and those writing blogs need page views. No, you don't have to spend money to support others - sharing on social media or word of mouth to friends is a great way to support others in the same boat as you, and who knows, maybe they'll return the favor and give you some support back which will mean more money and success for everyone.
Speaking of supporting others, we wouldn't be supporting ourselves if we didn't also mention that here at Lightailing we're living many LEGO lovers' dreams by making money through LEGO with our LEGO lighting kits. If you'd like to support us in that or you simply would like to look at our selection of LEGO lighting kits, then simply check out our store where you can shop by category and find the perfect lighting kit for you!
