>>11619904we found him! the ONE guy who won't buy the set because it has stickers!
guess what? Lego doesn't care about you. the $400 you would have spent saved Lego $40,000 (or more?) in printing and warehouse allocation real estate for piece-with-print.
everybody else just wants the set. they may grumble about stickers, but they still buy it.
(I agree with you though, it's very scummy of Lego not to "care" about a $400 set having stickers.)