LEGO VIP 5007331

The LEGO VIP program's reward center continues to be a roller coaster of ups and downs. We still had a few points left on our account, so we picked up the latest bit of non-brick swag up for offer – the VIP 5007331 Retro Tin Lunchbox. This blast from the past is available now, one-per-account, for 2500 points (US | CAN | UK). Is it worth the equivalent of a $20 US discount? Read on and see what we thought!

Like many of the latest non-brick-based VIP rewards, the packaging for this item consists of nothing put a flimsy piece of tissue paper. This is easily torn in shipping, as evidenced by the hole seen in the lower left here. I gave up a long time ago on ever having "mint in package" copies of these rewards. At least this time it didn't arrive with big dents.

The paper is sealed with a sticker giving some product details. As VIP Rewards addicts will have already guessed, this item is from Dongguan, China, and was produced by RDP Ltd., a marketing agency in the UK. This firm is also responsible for the VIP coins, tin Signs, and retro VIP keychain.

The paper sleeve slides off easily. It did a decent job of protecting the lunchbox from scratches.

The rewards center blurb fort this item reads "What a throwback! The iconic 1965 advert is back, but this time in tin form! This is a must-have for any LEGO fan, whether you want to show it off to your colleagues at lunchtime or use it as your own retro brick box."

I don't know how "iconic" that advert is. It's a few years before my time to see it "in the wild", and a quick google search doesn't find it in the plethora of more recognizable LEGO ads from that era. But it does look very retro, at least. For the curious, the dimensions for this are 20cm (7.9 inches) x 16cm (6.3 inches) x 7cm (2.8 inches)l; slightly smaller than an actual retro lunchbox.

The front and back of the lunchbox are almost identical, but the lid has a modern LEGO logo cropped into the lower right corner.

The sides have a red background with white line drawings lifted from the LEGO Brick patent.

The latch is plain tin, and the handle is a flimsy-feeling red plastic.

The back edge also has copyright info similar to the sticker on the wrapper.

Inside is a no-frills interior. There's no thermos, but I shudder to think how many points LEGO would have demanded for something that included one.

Well, this one isn't too bad, is it? The graphics are nice, it looks good on a shelf, and you could actually put bricks into it if you wanted to. On the downside, the price point is pretty steep – 2500 points is the equivalent of a $20 US discount. To wrack up that many points you’d need to spend over ~$380 US (or ~$190 if you took advantage of double point events) – a fairly steep ask even with LEGO price hikes. Interestingly, the US product page for this item currently shows it as a "gift with purchase". Personally, I would have preferred this as a GWP rather than a redeemable – at least that way the aftermarket price would probably be lower for people who don't have 2500 points just lying around waiting to use on snarky product reviews.

LEGO VIP 5007331 Retro Tin Lunchbox is available now for 2500 points from the VIP rewards center (US | CAN | UK )

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