Toys "R" Us

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Toys "R" Us

Type	Private
Founded	1948 (Washington, D.C., USA)
Headquarters	Wayne, New Jersey, USA
Key people	Gerald L. Storch Chairman and CEO, Toys R Us Inc.
Industry	retail
Products	Toys
Revenue	$11.1 billion USD
Employees	113,000
Slogan	The World's Greatest Toy Store.
Website	www.toysrusinc.com

Toys "R" Us (often typeset as Toys "Я" Us to fit their logo) is a toy store chain based in the United States, Canada, Australia and the United Kingdom. The company operates 587 stores in the United States and nearly 600 stores are operating in 29 other countries, some of them under franchises or licenses. The flagship store in New York City's Times Square is the largest toy store in the world^{[citation needed]}, featuring a colorful ferris wheel.

1 History
2 "R" Zone
3 Contest controversy
4 Other "'R' Us" chains
5 Logo
6 Mascot
7 Slogans
8 International locations
9 References
10 External links

[edit] History

[edit] Beginnings

Charles Lazarus initially started Toys "R" Us (LTD) in Washington, DC during the post-war baby boom era in 1948 as a baby furniture retailer known as "Children's Supermart". Its first location was at 2461 18th St, NW, where the nightclub, Madam's Organ Blues Bar is currently located. Lazarus began receiving requests from customers for baby toys. The company headquarters is located in Wayne, New Jersey.

A replica of the Chrysler Building, made entirely of Lego, on display at the Times Square location of Toys "R" Us in New York City.

[edit] Buyout

After several major missteps in the marketplace, mainly precipitated by the removal of one of the Board of Directors, Toys "R" Us experienced difficulty.^{[citation needed]} In an effort to shore up their enterprise, the Board of Directors installed John Eyler, formerly of FAO Schwarz. Eyler launched an unsuccessful, and very expensive plan to remodel and re-launch the chain. Blaming market pressures (primarily competition from Wal-Mart and Target Stores), Toys "R" Us considered splitting its toys and baby businesses. On July 21, 2005, a consortium of Bain Capital Partners LLC, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR), and Vornado Realty Trust completed the $6.6 billion acquisition of the toy giant. Public stock closed for the last time at $26.74, just pennies from the 52-week high, but far short of its all time high of almost $45 in fourth-quarter 1993, and its five-year high of $31 in 2Q 2001. Toys "R" Us is now a privately owned entity.

An exterior of a typical Toys "R" Us store in Rome, Georgia, United States.

[edit] Amazon lawsuit

In early 2006, Toys "R" Us won a major battle against Amazon.com after years of bitter battles over their original 10 year contract made at the height of the dotcom boom at the turn of the century. The battle focused on exclusivity rights as viewed from both company's perspectives. The judge in the matter had this to say about Amazon's top brass testimony:

In her opinion, McVeigh took a rather dim view of the trial testimony of some Amazon executives, including that of the company’s billionaire founder Jeff Bezos, saying she had "no doubt his knowledge and understanding (of the Toys "R" Us agreement) went much deeper than revealed." When pushed on the witness stand, "certain information 'just came back to him'" she said in the ruling, while another of Bezos’ explanations was referred to as "rather childlike." ^[1]

By the middle of 2006, Amazon's stock had taken serious 15% losses, one consideration being the $50 million per year payment lost from Toys "R" Us. Amazon announced the loss of the case late in the quarter to its stock owners. ^[2] ^[3]

On January 9, 2006, Toys "R" Us announced that 87 stores in the United States would close that year, most closing within the spring. 12 more stores are to be converted to the "Babies "R" Us" format. Approximately 3,000 jobs will be eliminated as a result of the closures. ^[4]

[edit] "R" Zone

The "R" Zone is the video game and consumer electronics department of Toys "R" Us stores. It carries a wide variety of products from Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, Nintendo DS and PlayStation Portable, to televisions, stereos, cell phones, MP3 players, and DVD players. The "R" Zone is much like its own store in that it also has security gates; in some branches, customers must purchase their items at the checkout within the "R" Zone.

[edit] Contest controversy

In 2006, the company announced that it would award a $25,000 savings bond as a prize to the first American baby born in the year 2007 whose parents had submitted a contest entry form. All "expectant New Year's mothers" were encouraged to apply. At the stroke of midnight on January 1, 2007, Yuki Lin was born at New York Downtown Hospital, and she won a runoff drawing against two other children. However, while Yuki is an American citizen, contest officials believed that the child's parents were not legal residents of the United States (a violation of the published rules), so they gave the prize instead to Jayden Swain, from Gainesville, Georgia.

This launched a firestorm of bad publicity worldwide, including China (her parents' homeland). Ironically, the chain had just entered the mainland Chinese market and had opened their first store in the country in the last weeks of 2006. Critics also pointed out that the other child's parents had immigrated from El Salvador, suggesting that the choice of a child whose parents were also American-born was motivated by xenophobia.

The company rapidly announced that all three children will be awarded $25,000 bonds. The prizes are intended for college tuition.

[edit] Other "'R' Us" chains

Toys "R" Us, Inc. also owns other chains:

Kids R Us - A store that is out of business, dealt with children's clothing. Most Kids "R" Us stores were co-branded with Toys "R" Us. Kids "R" Us is also the brand name label of kids' clothing found at the Geoffrey Stores.
Babies "R" Us - Baby superstores.
Geoffrey's Toys "R" Us/Geoffrey's - Stores for Toys "R" Us mascot Geoffrey the Giraffe, offering toys, juvenile merchandise, and children's apparel all in one location. Other features include a "Studio G" activity center. Mostly found in the American Midwest. The first store under the "Geoffrey" banner opened in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, but eventually closed.
Toys "R" Us Toy Box (introduced in 2003) - This version of Toys "R" Us is found in Albertsons, Giant, Jewel-Osco supermarkets, and stores in Hong Kong and Singapore.
Toys "R" Us KidsWorld - A toy superstore format introduced in 1996. Stores were built in Elizabeth, New Jersey, and Fairfax, Virginia (which was remodelled in 2006 into a standard Toys "R" Us).
Toys "R" Us/Kids "R" Us co-branded stores.
Toys "R" Us Express - mini store version of Toys "R" Us, found inside Asian stores. (Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, Taiwan (Republic of China), and other)
Imaginarium - An independent chain of kids toy stores with a focus on learning toys, located mostly in malls was bought by Toys "R" Us in 1999. Its mascots were Cosmo (a purple puppy) and Professor Fun. When most of the Toys "R" Us stores were remodeled, their layouts were redesigned to included an Imaginarium department.
Toys "R" Us Philippines- Toys "R" Us in the Philippines, found in the Robinsons Galleria mall.

[edit] Logo

The yellow reverse "R" in quotation marks, which is similar to the character "ya" (Я) in the Cyrillic alphabet, imitates a small child's backward writing of "R", which is short for "are". The "R" is the most distinctive part of the retailer's colorful kid-friendly logo. The current, modernized Toys "R" Us logo was introduced in the 1980s, a blue star was added to the logo in 1999. The "R Us" name has been imitated by many other businesses.

[edit] Mascot

Geoffrey Giraffe has been the official mascot for Toys "R" Us since the 1960s.

In the 1960s, an anthropomorphic cartoon giraffe character was introduced as Toys "R" Us's mascot. His name, Geoffrey the Giraffe, followed in the 1970s, after a "Name the Mascot"–type contest. He was later given an extended family: his wife Gigi, his daughter Baby Gee, and his son Giga Biter. He was re-introduced in 2001, not as a cartoon character, but as a real-life giraffe who talks; an animatronic version of Geoffrey the Giraffe (created by Stan Winston Studios), was voiced by Jim Hanks in commercials for radio and television.

In the UK, the Geoffrey mascot has been phased out in favour of the star.

[edit] Slogans

"The World's JOY Store!"
"Big Fun! Low Prices!"
"Lower Prices. Bigger Selection. Guaranteed."
"The World's Biggest Toy Store."
"R toys us? You bet they R!" (as seen in a 1978 print ad)
"The World's Greatest Toy Store."
"Play More, Spend Less."
"It's a magical day at Toys "R" Us"
"You'll never outgrow us."
"There's millions says Geoffrey all under one roof, it's called Toys "R" Us, Toys "R" Us, Toys "R" Us!" (used in the UK only)
"I don't want to grow up, I'm a Toys "R" Us kid!"
"Britain's greatest toy store" (UK use)
"Canada's greatest toy store!" (Canadian use)

[edit] International locations

Toys "R" Us, International is a separate division of which operates the toy stores outside of the United States. Toys "R" Us, International opened its first stores in 1984 in Singapore and Canada. Today, Toys "R" Us International operates, licenses or franchises approximately 570 toy stores in 29 countries outside the United States.

Toys "R" Us Japan

Australia, established 1991
Austria, 10 Stores
Bahrain
Canada, established 1984
China, established December 2006
Denmark
Egypt
Finland, established 2006
France
Germany, established 1987, 48 Stores, domicile of Toys "R" Us Europe (Cologne)
Hong Kong
Indonesia
Ireland^{[citation needed]}
Israel, established 1995 [1], 23 stores in 2006 [2]
Japan, established 1989
Macau
Malaysia
Netherlands
Norway
Philippines Opened late Feb
Portugal
Qatar 1 store, in Doha
Saudi Arabia
Singapore, established 1984, 7 stores including Vivocity
South Africa
Spain
Sweden, established 1994
Switzerland, 4 Stores
Taiwan (Republic of China)
Thailand, established 2005
Turkey
United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom, established 1985, 74 stores and 2 Babies "R" Us stores (which are in the process of being converted to normal Toys R Us format stores).
United States, established 1948 as Children's Supermart