Supply Chain Research

Toymaker Lego reported an 8% drop in revenues on a year earlier for 2017. That partly reflected excessive inventories of older product “crowding out” newer sets. That problem can be seen U.S. imports from Europe and Mexico which fell 13.3% in the third quarter of last year. An 8% recovery in the fourth quarter would suggest a clearing of the inventory build has been completed. A rise of just 3% in January and by 12% (for Europe only) in the first two months of the year suggests a recovery may be slow. The company will hope for a support to volumes from the forthcoming Star Wars film (tho...