It has once again been a privilege to serve as your President during 2024-2025. Whilst we have seen a drop in financial member numbers, our engagement with activities across the year has still been strong. Our group has a unique value proposition in that it provides an opportunity for anyone in the community to be involved and share their passion for LEGO, and building awesome creations - with low barriers to entry.
The group has two goals which are: 1) to promote and support the LEGO fan community in the ACT and surrounds; and 2) contribute to fundraising for children’s charities. The last year has enabled our group to be successful in these two areas even more so than the previous year. We have been able to promote and progress those goals amongst our membership and the Canberra community.
I would like to personally thank the 2025 Committee, who have once again worked tirelessly to prepare, conduct and improve on our activities. Without this team of committed individuals CLUG activities would not be possible.
CLUG Activities
Since the last AGM (4 August 2024), CLUG had a small niche display at the very popular GAMMA Canberra featuring pop-culture and sci-fi builds. We were also invited to a number of other similar events including Geek Markets and Oz Comic Con which were great opportunities for a display and also to promote the group.
We ran the third Canberra Brick Show in October which was a great success. With over 5,000 guests, 130 exhibitors and 12 vendors the show raised significant funding for the communities we support including Roundabout Canberra, Marymead Autism Centre, Malkara School, The Woden School, Black Mountain School and Cranleigh School. The 2024 show was able to include a good balance of CLUG builders and others from around Australia with a highlight being once again the CLUG Juniors section that allowed our members as young as 3 and 4 to get involved. I am once again very proud of the achievements of the club, supported by our friends from local and interstate in making the 2024 show a highlight for many people. We look forward to presenting the show again in early November 2025.
December saw the ever popular members Christmas Party where everyone went home with LEGO after enjoying a delicious BBQ cooked by the Wells Station Scout Group. The “Dirty Brickster” game again proved to be source of entertainment and competition as our adults and juniors took turns in vying for some prized LEGO sets.
Up until the end of 2024, our regular meetings at the Hellenic Club were well attended - often with 100 or more attendees displaying their builds and sharing insights into larger displays being planned for shows. In 2025 we needed to find a different venue for the meetings and the Melba Copeland Secondary School library was chosen. Our numbers have been 60-100 regularly over the last few months, with the junior members in particular building great things. We continue to see the juniors confidence in public speaking increasing and some great story telling to accompany their builds. Members have enjoyed our raffles each month, and quarterly super raffles with big prizes. We also featured a number of presentations at the meetings about recent shows attended.
Additionally, we completed the LUGbulk 2025 ordering and sorting process in good time with bricks being in over 50 builders brick-pits by mid June.
Other 2024-5 to date event highlights include:
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Kaleen Train Show 2025 – a huge train layout was voted the crowd favourite at the annual show for the 3rd year in a row. The wide radius track allowed for some high speed action and many different custom trains on display.
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Bricks @ Woden School 2025 – we returned to the The Woden School in May with another huge show. Over $20,000 was raised altogether for the school to put towards valuable projects for their students.
CLUG involvement around Australia
In addition to our own activities, our members have participated in LEGO fan events across Eastern Australia hosted by other LUGs. Some of these were:
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Brickvention January 2025 – Melbourne VIC
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BendigoBricks April 2025 – Bendigo VIC
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BrickBuilt Sydney May 2025 - NSW
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Newcastle Brickfest July 2025 – Newcastle NSW
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Several other regional shows across NSW and VIC.
Membership and Finances
Our club membership has dipped from 230 last year to over 170 this year. This was due to many families moving away or moving on from involvement in LEGO and some families having one financial member only.
One major change in the last year has been the move to secure all of our club assets in a commercial storage facility. The extra cost of this, plus the insurance, is a factor that will need to be considered into the future budget. Also the new venue has a monthly hire charge whereas the previous venue now no longer available to us was free to use. Revenue from memberships will be key, along with the raffles to ensure we can cover the cost of these necessary arrangements.
The CLUG financial position remains relatively healthy however with projected additional costs the committee will need to carefully plan fundraising activities and continue to advocate for adults and juniors to be financial for the year ahead.
The Year Ahead
2025-2026 promises to be an exciting year, with a diverse agenda of activities in the works. I look forward to again leading the committee, our membership continuing the journey of exploring the world of LEGO and supporting local children’s charities in an inclusive, family-friendly environment.
Play Well,
Jake
Jake Radloff
CLUG President
3 Aug 2024
Version History
| Date | Commit | Message | Committer | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-08-01 | d9dc31c |
add 2025 agm documents | Jamie Reid | View |