A few years have passed for Toys R We, after the iconic chain, closed its doors in mid-2018 and sold their brand and other assets in an attempt to finally settle their usual debts. Geoffrey, the giraffe, has not been able to rest in peace, however, thanks to try to revive the toy store: the last one is one new partnership with Macy’s online stores and brick and mortar.
An organization called Tru Kids Brand bought the rights to the Toys R Us name in 2018 and a year later, in July 2019, he revealed that he had partnered with an experiential retailer b8ta to create a file series of smaller mall-based stores which focused on a limited selection of selected toys combined with regular events and branding experiences. If you don’t remember Toys R Us’s triumphant return, not surprisingly, as when the announcement was made it was also revealed that only two stores would open for the 2019 holiday season: one in Houston, Texas and one in Paramus, New Jersey .
As if that wasn’t disappointing enough, it was later revealed that the Paramus store, in the Westfield Garden State Plaza mall, featured a series of sensors installed on the ceiling that b8ta used to track the movement and flow of customers in space to collect data on which items and screens were most attracted by buyers. I bought with a focus group and unfortunately b8ta declined to comment when Gizmodo reached out asking the retailer to “clarify how the data is collected, how long it is stored and whether buyers are notified that the technology is used in stores.”
Thirteen months after the Tru Kids New Jersey and Texas toy stores opened, both locations closed week after week in January 2021, victims of the challenges posed by the Covid-19 pandemic and increased competition from alternatives online shopping. Two months later, it was like that announced that WHP Global had acquired TRU Kids, a “leading company in brand acquisition and management,” and Geoffrey the Giraffe would return again.
Today WHP Global announced a new partnership with Macy’s that will take advantage of the retailer’s online presence to sell toys under the Toys R Us Mark (Macys.com/toysrus although it doesn’t look like it’s live), while Toys R Us physical stores will be added to more than 400 Macy’s retail outlets starting in 2022. It’s a shout out from more than 1,500 stores Toys R Us stores operated around the world before the company closed in 2018, but it will be a much bigger launch than what TRU Kids tried in 2019. The goal of the partnership is attract families in Macy’s stores in the hope that they will also buy other non-toy products during a visit, including millennials with young children.
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It’s not the first time Macy’s has partnered with a recognizable toy brand to try to attract a wider demographic to its stores. In 2018, he did signed an exclusive agreement with FAO Schwarz, which was the oldest toy store in the United States on Fifth Avenue in New York City became famous on the piano dance scene in the 1988 film Great starring Tom Hanks. FAO Schwarz filed for bankruptcy in 2003, was acquired by Toys R Us in 2009 and is now owned by the ThreeSixty Group. The 2018 deal meant the opening of Macy’s to 275 FAO Schwarz stores in its stores across the country, which presumably were not as successful as the retailer expected, as it is now trying essentially the same with Toys R Us brand instead.