This convenience store is truly a 'slice of life' sort of set. I had purchased the Shell convenience store new for a mere 60 dollars last year and was blown away by it in person. It's such a great set from a time period of Lego's history that was known for its lackluster design choices. Let's get into the features of it.

Truck

The truck screams '90's' with its triangular front and roofless design. Either way, it's still decent considering the rest of the late 90's vehicles and is not too simplified. I appreciate the available storage at the rear of the truck (and the ability to have it all fall out). The storage compartment is a great place to keep a boombox and some bills.

Bike

The bike, although a fairly insignificant addition to the set, is a really cute feature. It has a storage bin to its side and the minifigure that accompanies it has fantastic 90's charm.

Convenience Store

Despite its small size, this store really packs a punch. It's great! Right outside the store lays a stall for 'fresh' fruit as well as a stall for oil. A great addition is to the top of the store, where two sunroofs can be found. Unfortunately, there is a sticker spanning across three pieces on the roof.

The right side of the store has plenty going on. A garbage bin and map can be found here, along with some flowers (one of the flowers that is found outside is seen stolen on the box-art by the lady in the blue hoodie). There is plenty of spare space, which can be used to park a car, bike, or some unique builds that could be constructed to fill the space.

First stepping inside the convenience store, minifigures will encounter a stall with various drinks. To the left (for the minifigure) rests Shell Helix products and a refrigerator full of drinks and treats. Minifigures can check out to the right of the store, where a cash register and cashier are located.

For a small set, there sure is a lot going around!

Pros & Cons

Pros

• A cute build
• Two vehicles
• Three minifigures (for a small set, that's a great addition)
• Charm not commonly found during Lego's dark age
• Banana

Cons

• Many stickers (which are well-designed, prints are just more desirable)

• The roof is difficult to deconstruct (stickers)

• Although the truck is cutsie and all, it could've definitely of been better.

Final Verdict

For a promotional set that came out in 1999, against all odds, the Shell convenience store is a great set. I would recommend the store for every classic town (as long as the town-owner considers 1999 sets 'classic'). After all, it is one of the few places where minifigures can purchase groceries!

In terms of classic town, alternatives for groceries would have to spand into the custom range. The Legoland Idea Book 6000 has some great ideas (and stickers) for grocery stores, but the Shell convenience store is the closest classic set released used for the same purpose.

For the reasons I've explained above, I'm giving this set a score of 9/10 or 5/5 stars!

So before I begin, let me just get this out of the way: I live in the Big Bend region of the very far western region of Texas, in an extremely small town. There probably isn't a shell station within 300 miles of me.This is to say, I have never in my entire life seen or so much as heard of a "Shell Select Shop". I have absolutely no idea if this is a good representation of what it's supposed to be. I think in my various travels I've maybe seen ten Shell stations at all, ever, but I also tend to stick in southern America and rarely visit large cities so maybe that has something to do with it. What I'm getting at is, this may very well be the absolute least realistic and most pathetic attempt at re-creating a "Shell Select Shop" in Lego form imaginable, I would have absolutely no clue. Judging by the set it appears to be basically a convenience store without the gas pumps. Maybe that's wrong. Who knows.

That being said, I also have no clue where 1999-era me got this, or indeed any of the other Shell promotional sets. I'd assume my parents picked them up for me on their travels. I have no idea. I do remember seeing the Car Transporter and the Shell Tanker at various Wal-Marts in the area occasionally as a kid. I don't remember ever seeing this. Maybe I'm just not remembering things right. Maybe I snatched up the only one. Who knows.

That all being said: I absolutely love this set. This is an excellent representation of a convenience store. There are so many details in this that it almost makes up for the trainwreck that was the Octan Gas Station of '97's absolutely pathetic attempt at a convenience store. Almost.

The Truck: This truck appears to be an attempt at making a pickup truck. As with virtually every vehicle from the late nineties, it has no roof, because why would it? I mean who hasn't seen a convertible pickup truck? It's not great, it's not bad, it's just there. It's miles above most of the absolutely sad attempts at creating civilian cars that are in most of the other Town sets of the time period by virtue of having more than five pieces on it and a non-premade grill, so there's that. That said, I do wish they'd have thrown in another Ferrari like in the Gas Pumps set instead of this thing, but it serves its purpose. Every town needs civilian vehicles in order to just not be a 1984-esque police state and this is another one on the pile. The radio that the guy apparently keeps in his pickup bed is a welcome detail, but it's also basically the only detail on the whole truck.

The Convenience Store: So, so cool looking. The transparent blue sky-windows do a fantastic job of making it so you can see inside the building, which makes its displayability enormous for an AFOL. The details are incredible. Tons of motor oil, tons of fruit on sale (in a trough on the outside of the store... Can't say I've ever seen a gas station do that before but it's Lego Land, you're gonna have the occasional artistic liberty). I love the refrigerator made up of two white cabinet pieces with transparent blue windows inside of them; the popsicles and transparent cone bricks that probably represent sodas are a great touch. The cash register actually looks like a cash register for once and has a cash drawer and a counter to put your minifig's items on while they check out, a great detail. The flowers that decorate the building look fantastic as well.

There's a sticker-piece map that is the sole inhabiter of the right side of the (very large) baseplate that comes with the set. It's a cool enough addition though I can't help but wish that it was A) printed (the sticker is coming loose after nearly twenty years), and B) that there was a little more stuff to put on the right side of the baseplate, it looks very empty. Now of course you can add your own, as kid-me did, so it's not a huge deal at all.

There's also, drumroll please, one of those fantastic old-style bicycles that Lego just never releases enough of. I love these things. They stand up straight, fit onto baseplates and plates and bricks with no problem, and look super realistic. They're also brutal hard to find these days, so this is an excellent bonus to this set.

Building Experience: It pains me to give such a beloved set a four, but I will, soley because the constant companion Lego had at the time of Juniorisation still looms its ugly shadow over this set somewhat. Most of the wall bricks are those "six tall and two wide" huge pillar pieces Lego threw out everywhere at the time and they could've easily made it a bunch of 1x3 and 1x2 bricks to the same effect with the added bonus of upping the part count and increasing rebuildability. Oh well. As is it's not a bad build at all, just sort of wish they would've made the walls not the huge juniorized bricks.

The downside is that, in somewhat of a rarity for the era, it's extremely sticker-heavy, with one particularly bad example of a sticker over an assembly of not one or two but three pieces, one of which is a gray plate. Most Town Jr. sets actually didn't have stickers at all (a huge plus) but the promotional ones all do for reasons known only to Lego.

Parts: Interestingly if you don't count stickers I don't think any parts to this set are exclusives, but many are rare and all are used to fantastic effect. Rare bricks include the popsicle bricks (basically unobtainable outside of Bellville and Friends and the like, unless you want to dive into the Paradisa money-pit), the four blue transparent pieces that look excellent, the radio brick isn't exactly easy to find, the bicycle that I think I speak for everyone when I say Lego should release in bulk packs by the thousands, the trash can brick (can never have too many), the banana and apple bricks (also very hard to come by outside of Paradisa), and three of the sort of rare and always useful cabinet bricks. You also get one of those little gray trough-ish backpack bricks, here being used as a bicycle goods holder. The minifigures in this set are all fantastic civilian additions to your town, with the shell employee being an obvious standout as only a handful of sets have one and they're all promotional.

Playability: I had a blast with this thing as a kid, pretending it was a local Stripes station and the like. The sticker over assembly branding it as "SHELL SELECT SHOP" didn't last long, as stickers over assemblies never do among small children that like to build and rebuild things, making imagining it as a convenience store I've actually seen all the easier. As the crotchety old man that I am today, it's still a fantastic display piece. The interior of the building is actually well lit thanks to the skylights, something most Lego sets even to this day don't put into consideration when being designed. There's all sorts of poses you can make your minifigures have with this set, and if you combine them as I have with the other four (well, three really, we'll get to that) promotional sets from Shell in the same year, you can make a really, really good gas station scene for your Lego town.

Value for Money: This is another place that pains me to give lower marks but that's the truth of it: this set tends to be on the expensive side these days. It's another one in the category of "late nineties Lego sets that are unobtainable to buy outside of the Netherlands and the like for less than scalping prices" for whatever reason. Good luck finding one for sale in the USA, and if you do it's going to be as much as buying an actual bicycle. If you don't mind importing things from bricklink a number of sellers do have it usually for pretty good prices, but of course you have to pay a ton in shipping and wait forever for it to hit American shores. Of course if you're reading this and, say, live in the Netherlands, what are you waiting for? Pick this thing up. It's well worth the twenty USD it can be had for! When you add in the additional 20 USD to get it imported, it becomes a slightly harder bargain, but I also am cheap as they come so your results may very. If the difference in money between 20 and 40 dollars isn't a huge issue for you, absolutely pick this up. I haven't seen a better gas station set with as much charm as this. I've also been out of the Lego loop for nearly 20 years so maybe it's gotten even better, who knows.

Probably also worth noting is that if you're holding your breath waiting for Lego to re-release this thing or any of the other Shell sets... You're going to be waiting a while. From what I've gathered Greenpeace decided that their time, money, and effort was better spent convincing the creators of an oil-based plastic toy company to not release one or two promotional branded sets every two years instead of, I don't know, studying the effectiveness and efficiency of green energy types or trying to convince Japan to outlaw whaling, and amazingly Lego actually caved and decided to stop releasing them. This is fortunate, as the fact that neat sets like this and the other Shell promotional sets that are usually only vaguely Shell-related at all aren't going to be released anymore means that the oil industry's hold over the automotive and energy sectors of basically every developed nation on earth has now been released, and we can all breath easier with that in mind.

This set is really the best set I have. This set has money, food, a car/truck and it has a rare door. This set also has a refrigerator with soda and a popsicle and a fudgesicle two rare pieces. Then it has a lot more soda and helix motor oil. There is also a counter with one drawer and as I mentioned earlier there is money in the drawer. There is also a cash register and outside there is a map and fruit. The fruit is two banana`s and one apple. Overall I have no complaints. This set is a must buy.

This set is very nice and fits into any town well. It includes some rare pieces and 3 minifigs. It's a little small, but for the price, it is great.

pros:

• 3 minifigs
• lots of food: apples, bananas, popsicles...
• lots of playability
• great price per piece ratio
• nicely built, sturdy truck/car
• windows in roof
• flowers
• bicycle

cons:

• could use a tree in the grass by the map

Overall, this set is very nice with much playability. All the nice parts of this set make this a must have for town/city collectors.

If you have the Shell Station like I do, this set goes perfectly with it. You get alot of great pieces like a banana piece and a rare popiscle piece. The design of the store is very cool because it has a cash register, freezers, and some items that your minifig can pick up. Overall, this set is really awesome and is a must buy.