In 2013 LEGO released 1 Ideas sets. The largest Ideas set from 2013 was
21103 The DeLorean Time Machine with a piece count of 401 and a retail price of $34.99. The current estimated value of all these Ideas sets from this year is about $133.23 which represents a 380.8% growth.
The LEGO Ideas theme, which started in 2008 as an offshoot of the Japanese website Cuusoo, then formally known as LEGO Cuusoo, is based around a website which allows users to submit ideas for LEGO products to be turned into potential sets available commercially. If fellow users in the LEGO Ideas community up vote the project to 10000 then LEGO Group has a committee which votes on whether to build the set and release it. If the project is approved and cleared for production, it is developed and later released as an official set under the "LEGO Ideas" banner and the original designer receives 1% of the royalties and a number of free sets. Typically, a few projects are approved a year and most are rejected due to various restrictions.
2013 LEGO Sets
2013 included a number of notable theme releases including the Legends of Chima, The Lone Ranger, Galaxy Squad, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Jake and the Never Land Pirates and Mickey Mouse & Friends. The flagship release was Legends of Chima with the coincided premier of The Legends of Chima TV Show on Cartoon Network. However, LEGO unfortunately did retire a number of well-loved themes such as Monster Fighters, SpongeBob SquarePants, Cars and Dino. One interesting note is that in 2013, LEGO started changing from 4-digit set numbers to 5-digit set numbers. 2013 was also the year that LEGO release the exclusive Mr. Gold in its collectable minifigures blind bags. This event single handled created one of the greatest investment opportunities for collections LEGO has seen.