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Thread: ToysRUs UK & US bankruptcy & closure

  1. #91
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    maybe toys as a stand alone store is just not profitable enough.

    how many have we seen before that no longer a nationwide store?


    uncle pete's, toy world, world 4 kids, now toys r us....

    that just leaves toy mate left


    but honestly, i think 80% of us buy online at least 80% of the time.

  2. #92
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    Quote Originally Posted by Penetrator View Post
    maybe toys as a stand alone store is just not profitable enough.

    how many have we seen before that no longer a nationwide store?


    uncle pete's, toy world, world 4 kids, now toys r us....

    that just leaves toy mate left


    but honestly, i think 80% of us buy online at least 80% of the time.
    Yep, for collectors, TRU is a place to get stuff straight away but pay an impatience tax. I do buy from them though mainly when they have 20% off or something. That being said they do miss a fair bit of the collectors market. For example, if it's for Japanese and more specialized stuff that you and most of us also get then this is not an option with local chain stores. The only TRUs which cater more broadly for collectors are in Asia but at the same time there are also more speciality toy stores there too. Will be interesting to see how TRUs go globally as it still has a strong trading brand but unsustainable business model.

  3. #93
    bowspearer Guest

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    Quote Originally Posted by ChlorHex View Post
    Sad days for Australian retail

    It's the pricing strategy that TRU utilized that failed them... I really don't understand how they expected buyers to pay significantly more when next door at Target or Kmart you can get the same thing for less.

    Man, it just sucks that we're losing TRU... another one bites the dust.
    I understand it completely. It's the typical approach of predatory pricing - undercut the little guy then raise your prices to insane levels once they're dead.

    "And we would've gotten away with it too if it weren't for those meddling department stores."

  4. #94
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    ^ "predatory pricing"... Yes, that sums it up.

  5. #95
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    ToysRUs (America) have managed to find a buyer for their Canadian arm... so hopefully the Australian Branch finds a buyer quickly, before the Administrators get too impatient and shut down the business, liquidating all remaining assets.

  6. #96
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    A short history video of ToysRUs, from its beginning to end... and a sad look at various abandoned stores in America, which we will see here soon too (but not for long, as most TRU stores here are part of a busy shopping centre that will fill out the location fairly quickly - most US TRU stores were stand-alone buildings, specially built for TRU with their iconic design and colours, so most will end up being left abandoned or demolished).
    I just hate how often this sort of thing happens due to sharemarket trading - a profitable business has their shares bought up by an investment firm, only to be over-estimating its value and taking on too much debt to buy all of the shares... resulting in the business being shut down instead of the investment firm, who get most of their money back by selling off the assets and foreign branches. The investment firm should be force to use their own assets to save the still-viable business they are killing off.

    ToysRUs in America was still generating about US$12 Billion in annual sales, and would have been making an annual profit if they weren't paying back US$400 million in debt repayments and interest every year. The last three or four years had an annual loss of US$100-200 million, which is thanks to that debt repayment, not from the way the business was being run. If the investment firm didn't over-extend themselves on their greedy buying up of shares, the business would still be operating, and quite profitably, despite competition from Amazon and Walmart.
    (the exact same thing happened here with the Dick Smith stores, when an investment firm found out that they were tricked into spending too much on the business, resulting in the business being shut down instead of the investment firm)



    At least for us, we will still have the national chain of Toyworld stores here, as an exclusive store for toys to walk into and soak in aisles of toys.

    In America, they had Kaybee toys as their version of Toyworld, which didn't survive the peak period of ToysRUs dominance in the early noughties, so now American kids don't have any major toy store to walk into and enjoy the magic of wanting everything they see (like a kid in a candy store).


    It's funny that, when ToysRUs first appeared here in Australia in the mid 90s, I never liked it, because it resulted in the squeezing out of some Toyworld stores. It was only more recently that I embraced it, as I ended up being reliant/addicted to it, for the convenience of the nearby store, that I would check every week or two.
    I feel bad for the Australian stores that only just opened in the last couple of years, or the employees who only recently got a job and will now have to go through the whole job-hunt process again so soon.
    And there was such optimism here in the last 12 months, with huge expansion plans on the horizon, including their proposed Express stores in those old Masters hardware buildings (like a mini shopping centre with several small outlets, with TRU announcing their intention to be located in a few of them).

  7. #97
    Galvatran Guest

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    I attended the opening of the South Morang store last year(?), which was inside the defunct Masters store. The line up snaked all the way out to the mini complex's entrance.

  8. #98
    hYpNoS is offline Rank 6 - Dedicated Member
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    I was for 2 toys r us openings, werribee plaza and one in gelong, not even a year and dead, I feel for the staff especially the plaza one, seeing all those familiar faces now without a job

  9. #99
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    Could the Asian arm of ToysRUs be in trouble now?
    According to an article in Bloomberg, the creditors of the liquidated US company, are trying to auction off the Asian branch, to potentially make a further US$1 Billion dollars to the creditors, who are currently expecting to get just 22 cents in the dollar at this time.

    But the sale of the ToysRUs in Asia is being held up by an Asian company who has a 15% stake in the business... and is believed to have been interfering with the process to prevent its sale, so they might be forced to sell their stake by a US court so that the whole business (ToysRUs Asia) can be auctioned off in September.



    It all sounds so messy at the moment, and I really hope that this internal interference doesn't put the whole business at risk, by forcing the creditors to instigate a complete liquidation as the only alternative to get some of the money back.

    Having ToysRUs stores remain in Asia (Hong Kong, Singapore, Philippines, Japan, Taiwan, etc) makes those nearby destinations more appealing to toy collectors, and they are an alternative source of exclusives or regular toys that don't get released here (if you know someone, or use a shipping forwarder).

  10. #100
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    ToysRUs lives on in America... and could see a return globally, but not like it was before.


    According to a section in the ongoing TRU bankruptcy case, it has been decided that the the ToysRUs branding won't be sold off, but instead will be allowed to be kept as the surviving business for licensing (and possibly franchising) purposes.
    Which could see an eventual return of stores with that name in America and here, but since TRU have already sold off all of their inventory and infrastructure, I would imagine that it would end up being more like McDonalds or Toyworld - with the main company selling franchise licenses, providing the stock and making a commission from the sales (in return for doing the cost of marketing and advertising).
    If all that does end up happening here and in America, what a kick in the teeth for all those thousands of people who lost their jobs this year... to then see the company return with all new employees.

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