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Thread: ToysRUs UK & US bankruptcy & closure

  1. #11
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    ^ Amazon calls it 2 day shipping but in many cases you can receive your item is as little as a couple of hours. In a city like San Francisco, LA or New York where it's already inconvenient to go to a shopping centre a couple of hours for it to show up on your doorstep for free is a much better deal.

    Also they have exchanges and refunds worked out. There are many customers that will buy say 3 pairs of shoes, figure out which one pair they actually want and return the other two because Amazon has made it so easy to do refunds and exchanges.

    Amazon has put dozens of entire shopping centres in America out of business, TRU is just another victim.

  2. #12
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    Amazon Japan does the same thing, but they still have retail businesses because their brick and mortar stores are still offering something that online stores can never match - good quality customer service. The thing that sometimes irritates me about shopping in Australia is when I encounter poor or just apathetic customer service. Like when I speak with staff they are often abrupt and inhospitably dismissive. When you shop in Japan you're treated very well and it's a pleasurable experience that makes you want to shop again in the future.

  3. #13
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    Whatever. Don't care. Never got the nostalgia for Toys R Us other people have. They really have no one but their own arrogance to blame for this.

  4. #14
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    Considering the way I've been F'ed over by both the Aussie and US TRU online stores this news doesn't shock me - both their online sales practices and customer service is woeful to say the least. Chooks coming home to roost as far as I'm concerned.

    Maybe if they actually listened to complaints and tried to rectify their practices so they didn't keep making the same idiotic mistakes, customers might not have flocked elsewhere

  5. #15
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    This article has some interesting info and stats about the US ToysRUs.

    - their remaining debt of US$5 billion had debt repayments of US$400 million per year.
    - they generated US$11.5 billion in sales last year and their annual profits were increasing for the last three years, only just getting above the debt repayment amount in the last financial year with a profit of US$460 million.
    - so why file for bankruptcy if they were heading in the right direction?... 40% of their suppliers stopped giving them credit, and started demanding payment on delivery, just before the Christmas period, which accounts for 40% of their annual sales.
    - bankruptcy protection now allows TRU to buy more stock from the money that would have been used to pay their debts, allowing them to keep making profits that encourage other sources to invest to cover their debt (it seems that they already have US$3 Billion raised).
    - the bigger toy companies like Hasbro, Mattel, and MGM need TRU so much that they will be providing more help with exclusives (and probably cheaper prices to improve their margins), which will also help reassure investors to help keep TRU alive.
    - TRU in America accounts for 11% of Hasbro's sales and 9% of Mattel's sales, second only to Walmart, so they need TRU to survive or risk losing hundreds of millions in revenue.
    - their debt agreements prevent it from shutting down stores in America, so people there shouldn't be worried about their nearest store disappearing at this time.

  6. #16
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    It should be noted that there are two forms of bankruptcy in America for companies. Chapter 11 and Chapter 7. Chapter 11 forces your creditors to renegotiate with you to keep you in business, but this doesn't always work and sometimes it goes to the next level. Chapter 7 is what we think of bankruptcy which is the company is gone, it comes after Chapter 11. Both Chapter 11 and 7 are bad, but 11 isn't as bad.

    Since according to that article they are forced to not close stores under their current agreement I bet that is one thing they will change in their new agreement if Chapter 11 succeeds, which it doesn't always. If they can't close stores that would mean if there are a few store running at a huge loss dragging down their profits then they wouldn't be able to do the right business decision and shut them.

    I still think retail is doomed.

  7. #17
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    Terrible news for workers at 180 TRU stores in America with 180 stores closing.

    https://www.seibertron.com/transform...in-2018/40543/

    On the bright side for US toy shoppers they are liquidating $200m in stock, so bargain time if you're in the US.

    https://www.seibertron.com/transform...details/40545/

  8. #18
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    It's a lot of stores, but that still leaves about 89% open, which could have been necessary to offload sluggish stores to keep the other 1420 stores open.

    I wonder if I've been to any of the ones that are closing... meh, it'll take too long to look it up.

  9. #19
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    The UK situation has deteriorated, to the point of entering Administration... which means that someone unrelated to the business comes in and sees if it is best to salvage the business or to see if it needs to be closed up and get as much of its debts paid off as possible.
    Since their issue is unrelated to the US problem, this collapse is just coincidental timing, and shouldn't have any affect on ToysRUs branches in other countries (like ours or in Asian countries).

  10. #20
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    Quote Originally Posted by griffin View Post
    The UK situation has deteriorated, to the point of entering Administration... which means that someone unrelated to the business comes in and sees if it is best to salvage the business or to see if it needs to be closed up and get as much of its debts paid off as possible.
    Since their issue is unrelated to the US problem, this collapse is just coincidental timing, and shouldn't have any affect on ToysRUs branches in other countries (like ours or in Asian countries).
    It's a shame about the UK branch. I've had (to me anyway) significant issues with the US and Aus branches but I have fond memories of the TRU's in the UK. I got my Reissue PM Prime & Hot Rod, RID(01) Bludgeon & Scourge as well as Armada Unicron from them when living there - fond memories indeed

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