In the beginning, Ole Kirk Christiansen worked as a carpenter at his own company which suffering economically dropping his last employee at work. Heading back to his house the talked to his wife Sofie Jörgensen soon discussing his company downfall believing things will get worse. Her wife humbled about his wording saying “I know, it’s hard to understand but at least now it cant get much worse”.
But it did got worse, losing his wife, his business, and financially declining. So, he kept on thinking on ideas and never giving up on his journey towards success.
Ole Kirk Plan Before Inventing Lego
First, he developed a wooden duck toy with strings attached mimicking the duck movement which his 4 little boys loved. This wooden duck would become a symbol of the first innovation Ole Kirk created. (an article about this topic – Chessmen Museum website)
From feedback from his kids he gotten confident to try making new toys saving up wood resources from the carpentry production. With his past experience of carpentry he understand quality and detail but his new business sales were pretty slow. His son Godtfred Kirk Christiansen helped his dad from boosting sales of his company. From word of mouth marketing people know his high quality wooden toy in Billund.
One man. An wholesaler from Fredericia named Jens W. Olesen entered into his shop soon changing his life for the better. He loved how Ole Kirk made his wooden toys soon buying out his product to later sell the toys back to his shop during Christmas.
Back to work, Ole only used the highest quality of wood: Handpicked, and carefully prepared. However his had a problem.
In the middle of their work, Ole Kirk received a latter from the wholesaler detailing he had filed for bankruptcy, not able to pay for their toys. Then, he decided to become his own salesmen trying to get individuals to buy their product. He wasn’t a good salesmen, lacking his true details on how good their toys are. (quality, & carefully crafted)
Nevertheless, his planned worked selling out his toys but didn’t received much money. His family was poor and didn’t have enough food so he spend those money on buying food for his family during Christmas.
How LEGO was Named
Time has passed but didn’t sell quickly as he expected. His next plan is to create a memorable name for his toy company. Ole Kirk wanted his name resemble the words “Playing Well.” In Danish, is spelled as “Leg Godt” He named it LEGO which he didn’t realized how suitable the word Lego would be because it was a Latin word for “I put together.”
His brand name improved toy sales. Godtfred saw a new machine named ‘Jydsk Maskinfabrik’ while looking for a new machine to creating toys. Even though Kirk wasn’t comfortable spending money on a milling machine he vision this machine uses in the future as being useful, improving his quality of work.
In the late 1930’s during WW2, Lego was making a profit. But on a stormy winter night in 1942, his workshop is on fire. Firefighter arrived, with no hope of saving his workshop. Ole Kirk detailed drawings, blueprints, & products were gone, almost losing his company. He never give up again, realizing the time and effort he spend on being responsible for his children and workers inspired him to rebuild Lego. Soon, he rebuild his workshop again from ground up bringing back his workshop.
How Lego was Invented
Copenhagen, 1946 – The Lego factory ran smoothly and Ole Kirk was looking for a new challenge. He went to Copenhagen to look at new plastic molding machine just arriving at Denmark and Ole was excited about it. He talked to his son Godtfred about his decision whether buying the machine was worth the expensive cost. Ole Kirk decided to buy the machine.
This made his reproduction from wooden toys to making little plastic teddy bears and rattles.
Ole Kirk later looked at the plastic brick he received at the fair seeing a brick similar to Lego. Even though no one see the potential in them, Ole decided to redesign and put them into production. But Lego first launched the grey Fergus and tractor that the plastic toys became a success. (Here’s an article about this plastic toy here – the LEGO Ferguson tractor – LEGO.com)
During the summer sales dropped Godtfred decided to become a salesmen similar to once his father was one during financial crisis, which helped the Lego company from being bankrupted.
On a business trip to England in 1954, Godtfred meet the head of a big shopping center on his way home (Troels Petersen) discussing the future of Lego. The man quoted while believing kids aren’t interested in toys anymore. “They work fine, sure but there’s no system in anything.” Godtfred took the word “system” and trying to make sense into his Lego company.
"There isn't any system. The toys need an idea and a system build around it. I wanna put system into play. Children have only been given ready-made solutions. They need something different that will strengthen their imagination and creativity." - Godtfred
In 1954, the “system” was in place in Lego marking their first building set as building a house from Lego bricks of a city theme teaching kids about traffic safety. The system in play revealed how kids are describe to be intelligent and smart from just building a simple brick into a full usable set to play with while the setting plays a whole role about the environment they’re in.
This was a huge breakthrough, Godtfred sell the play set intentionally due to the “system” of play becoming very popular.
One issue Lego faced was the bricks wasn’t strong enough to hold it together. Godtfred wondered a way to make Lego bricks stick together finally solving the issue.
The Solution – having tubes inside the bricks.
Lego Downfall & Up-rise
Just like his father, Godtfred had the fire incident again at his workstation. From his father past experience with the same situation he never gave up. Thinking ahead, he discontinued his wood toys and instead focus on the Lego system.
In 1961, his business grew stronger. Many new models were built and Lego got stronger in the toy industry. Godtfred decided to build a new airport to sell his toys easier around the world. 3 years later the Billund airport was opened.
Guests and business connections can see what’s going on inside the modeling department. It gotten so crowded he decided to create Legoland on June 7, 1968 in Billund, Denmark developing Lego as a worldwide empire, inviting millions of children and adults to experience the “System of Play” in real life.