WHO'LL SAVE THE TOYS

[Son of Wobble]

but thanks, Son of Wobble for bringing us all down with such sad news

 

[Son of Wobble]

These two pieces represent 40% of my present toy portfolio.

Sometimes when I'm frustrated, I set the pair to wrasslin'. Nothing quite like a little "action man therapy."

 

[Son of Wobble]

My favorite toy hails from a museum in Melbourne, Australia and resides atop my Ampeg.

 

[Son of Wobble]

 

[slobake]

These two pieces represent 40% of my present toy portfolio.

Sometimes when I'm frustrated, I set the pair to wrasslin'. Nothing quite like a little "action man therapy."

View attachment 2944329

I'm rooting for Joey. Is that the promoter holding them both up?

 

[fdeck]

How so?

My interpretation is that a certain fraction of their volume was basically impulse purchases. Another fraction may be sales to people who won't necessarily switch to online retail, such as grandparents.

 

[MJ5150]

my son is an avid star wars collector, and i'm a fan of several brands of toys. as such, i've spent many years going to TRU.

back in the '90s, TRU stores were clean, well stocked and well organized. the people who worked there seemed to want to help. these days the culver city store looks like a bargain basement place, with little personality, worn out displays, shelves and floors and overworked reps who sometimes don't care while others care but are hopelessly overworked. the store carries some cheap crappy stuff, not even always toys, that the put in the front and main aisles of the store to make it look less like a toy store. it's sad if they go under, but honestly they're not the store chain they used to be.

i gather that walmart has been outselling them when it comes to toys for years now, or so i've read on CNN money a few times.

we used to have fun going to TRU stores - we'd sometimes hit four or five stores with a stop for lunch. the stores just aren't fun any more, so we don't bother, and it's the stores themselves that made us less inclined to go there. as far as i can see when we do drop in, some are running on fumes, and that's not an environment that makes me happy to be there.

Swap out Culver City for Olympia, and you've described to a tee the closest location to us.
My son and I used to visit weekly in the hunt for the elusive series of Matchbox cars. Tech Decks too.
We never found a Matchbox car worth a ton of money, but we sure had fun looking. We found out years later that is was common for store employees to dig through the inventory first and set the good ones aside for friends to come in and buy later.

-Mike

 

[guy n. cognito]

My interpretation is that a certain fraction of their volume was basically impulse purchases. Another fraction may be sales to people who won't necessarily switch to online retail, such as grandparents.

The 10-15% is pure speculation. While TRU May have been buying toys with little demand, any toy with true CONSUMER demand will find a multitude of other retail channels.

 

[JRA]

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[Son of Wobble]

As this article from the L.A. Times explains, the reason the demise of Toys R Us will hurt small manufacturers is because the store was in fact a proving ground for products hoping to get distributed by the #1 brick and mortar toy store in the U.S.: Wallymart.


Excerpt:

Toys R Us Inc. doesn't sell the most toys in the U.S. — that distinction goes to Walmart Inc. — but it has remained a key proving ground for kids' gadgets, games and other playthings.

And that may be the biggest blow to the toy industry if the retailer moves ahead with a liquidation of its U.S. operations, a prospect that became more likely this week.

Toys R Us is still the place where up-and-coming products get discovered. The retailer devotes so much of its space to toys — rather than the few aisles at Walmart and Target Corp. — it can take chances on new items and smaller suppliers. In many cases, a product is tested at Toys R Us for a season, then added to one of the mass-market chains.

If Toys R Us disappears in the U.S., innovation will be hurt, according to Gerrick Johnson, an analyst for BMO Capital Markets. Toymakers also will have less of an opportunity to promote their wares all year long, rather than just during the holiday rush.

"Without a dedicated toy retailer — 365 days a year — you will see growth in the industry slow," Johnson said. "Toys R Us is where new products can be discovered and blossom. It's also where smaller toy companies can have an opportunity."

Toys R Us liquidation would leave a giant hole in the toy industry

 

[Son of Wobble]

 

[Son of Wobble]

Ed Roman's in Las Vegas was the Toys R Us of guitar shops.

 

[pcake]

i didn't realize till today that bain capital had done the same thing to TRU that they did to GC - buy them, saddle them with billions of their debts and let them struggle.

we took one last trip to TRU today, and i must admit we felt very sad, like a family member had died...

a little trip down memory lane... in 1999 just before star wars episode one (the phantom menace) came out, my husband, son (in his 30s at the time) and i stood in line outside the new los feliz TRU for hours till they let us in at midnight. they were building another store next to it, so there was mud everywhere, but everyone in line was in great spirits and we all chatted with each other. once the door opened at midnight, everyone discovered that the most popular figure was darth maul, and they were bringing out small lots of their guess for the most popular figures; one employee would pull out the next figure and show it around, the other would throw it into the crowd. it was fun, and while we didn't catch a darth maul, i did catch an anakin.

after an hour at that store, we drove to a couple more at like 2 am, and the employees were having a blast as were the customers. we went to a couple more events, as well. they don't do 'em like that any more, but they were great shared times for us and we bought many figures...

 

[fdeck]

The 10-15% is pure speculation. While TRU May have been buying toys with little demand, any toy with true CONSUMER demand will find a multitude of other retail channels.

That's a very good point. An interesting question could be how consumer demand is driven. Is it by advertising, childrens TV shows, the Internet, word of mouth, etc? Retail store placement is one of those channels.

With that said, I don't know what drives the toy industry, so anybody's guess is probably better than mine.

 

[Michedelic]

First world problem.

 

[BurnOut]

Ed Roman's in Las Vegas was the Toys R Us of guitar shops.



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And Ed was the delightful happy go lucky proprietor of that toy store!

 

[ImNotJoel]

I am surprised it stayed open so long you can get the same exact toys at Walmart or on Amazon.

Only Toys R Us that closed that kind of surprised me was the one in timesquare. The prices there where actually on par with Amazon and Walmart and it was a tourist stop. However the rent there was probably crazy so it is not that surprising.

 

[buldog5151bass]

Just like with music stores, there is nothing like cruising through toy stores for a kid. I remember when I was young, about once a week the family would go to the mall in Paramus. While my mother got her shopping fix, my father would take us to the pet stores, Sam Good so I could drool over the guitars, and toy stores.

 

[guy n. cognito]

First world problem.

I suppose we could dismiss every discussion on this forum with this quip.....right?

 

[Son of Wobble]

i didn't realize till today that bain capital had done the same thing to TRU that they did to GC - buy them, saddle them with billions of their debts and let them struggle.

we took one last trip to TRU today, and i must admit we felt very sad, like a family member had died...

a little trip down memory lane... in 1999 just before star wars episode one (the phantom menace) came out, my husband, son (in his 30s at the time) and i stood in line outside the new los feliz TRU for hours till they let us in at midnight. they were building another store next to it, so there was mud everywhere, but everyone in line was in great spirits and we all chatted with each other. once the door opened at midnight, everyone discovered that the most popular figure was darth maul, and they were bringing out small lots of their guess for the most popular figures; one employee would pull out the next figure and show it around, the other would throw it into the crowd. it was fun, and while we didn't catch a darth maul, i did catch an anakin.

after an hour at that store, we drove to a couple more at like 2 am, and the employees were having a blast as were the customers. we went to a couple more events, as well. they don't do 'em like that any more, but they were great shared times for us and we bought many figures...

Your post reminded me of the days when fans lined up at Tower Records at midnight for new releases such as GnR's "Use Your Illusions" CD's, a double-release that sold an amazing 500,000 copies nationwide in the first two hours it was on sale.

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