Every time I go into a shop looking for Lego, I no longer see many generic sets: castles, pirate ships, cars, trucks, but they're all big name IP licenses: Pirates of the Caribbean ships, Harry Potter castles, Volvo Trucks, Range Rover SUVs, McLaren cars, BMW motorcycles, etc.
Now they're all just fancy collectables meant to sit on display instead of being generic sets where you had to use your imagination to make what you want it to be: that generic looking car could be a McLaren, could be a Ferrari, could be whatever you wanted it to be. Then take it apart and mix it with the rest of your sets to create something original.
And the IP licensing is reflected in the price for the sets. I wouldn't be surprised if many of Lego's customers are just nostalgic grown men with disposable income, instead of curious kids.
Me thinks Meccano should have taken the same path if they wanted to survive but I'm not an executive in the toy industry to know for sure.