Goodbye TRU?

[joelones]

Agreed, they have plenty of options going forward. I can't imagine they'd completely disappear from Canadian B&R retail, after all, their biggest competitor (Walmart) doesn't nearly have the same product offerings - Target's gone, there's no Walgreens, kmarts, etc. as in the states, so competition's really not the problem, at least not here in Canada.

So, is it distribution, product offerings, pricing? I think they have a problem with each of these, but we can't deny the Internet changed everything. Smartphones, tablets, one-touch buying, of all this, has altered our spending habits. That's a reality. Amazon saw it coming, TRU didn't. Just think of all of Amazon's innovations...

If their overhead costs are what's eating them, perhaps a different strategy makes sense - liquidate its real-estate holdings & B&R stores and beef up their online presence, along with a website overhaul - that caters to individual buyers' preferences and offers a better buying experience and competes on price. I'm sure the big TRU execs are at least aware of this fact, but is it a case of a little too late? At the very least least their got one thing: their brand. The TRU name still has value.

[thatVWandTFguy]

Originally Posted by steamwhistle

Order ahead online or in-store with the old CD-style slips (or a more modern in-store electronic kiosk), and then have staff retrieve items from the back-of-store.

This. I use a 3D printing products distributor that provides this option as an alternative to shipping. They still offer shipping, and if you qualify for free shipping you can get it locally within 24 hours, but I prefer to go pick it up. He has little to no overhead other than what is essentially his warehouse, but I can still go in a talk shop. Its definitely the way to go and if this continue the way they are I can see this becoming the norm.

Funny that you brought up CD though, no one I know remembers them well. We had one pretty close to our house growing up. Used to love going there and getting to pick something out, then see it come out on the conveyor belt. Very exciting as an 8 year old. Can even recall a few G1 toys purchased at one, namely a Squawkbox that I promptly lost.

[Dark Rage]

Funny how a company like Consumers Distributing didn't work in the 90's, but it might be a more viable method in today's market (assuming the prices are competitive/similar to Amazon/online pricing).

[justprime]

Originally Posted by Scrapper6

I don't even know what you're talking about.

Stopped carrying full lines? WTF? They've always carried full lines.

Cut the store in half? Babies are always being born, in order to keep afloat the parent company decided it was time to open up their niche market a bit and try and get new parents in to make profits.

MP10 Fiasco? I'm sorry, but the retailer has no control over what the fucking distributor gives them or how bad the scalp-bait such items as MP10 actually are.

Limited releases? I have no clue what you're going on about, everyone is having problems with distribution right now, it isn't just TRU, everyone is having problems getting product to store shelves and whole swaths of lines vanish quickly because kids, scalpers, parents, collectors and the like are going nuts buying up whatever little scraps they can find.

And you'd better miss them if they go, because if they go then the only option available to us will be Wal-Mart, and they don't fucking give a rats ass about their customers, they sure don't cater to adult collector bases on such a grand scale. When's the last time you found a Wal-Mart exclusive in a Canadian retail store? I never even saw the recent Shocktrooper at retail anywhere or the Scariff Stormtrooper Leader, or whatever the fuck it was called.

If they had them they only had them through their website and not everybody uses Wal-Mart.ca because TRU still accepts Paypal while Wal-Mart's online shit store won't give it the time of day.

And you're deluding yourself if you think a toy manufacturer wants to have retail presence diminished or reduced in a country, Hasbro isn't going to step in and start operating Hasbro brand retail stores, the entire point of Wal-Mart, TRU, Amazon and the rest is that they pay money to Hasbro to stock their products, they don't want to have the added costs of maintaining, operating and controlling their own retail stores to eat into their profits.

I for one do not want to see TRU go, sad to say I have very little control in how that goes, so I'm praying and hoping that we won't see the end of that retail giant for at least another ten years or so. But again there's very little I can do in that regards besides continuing to shop with them and use them over Wal-Mart whenever I can.

TRU is currently the largest supplier of LEGO and Mega Bloks in the retail environment right now, Wal-Mart doesn't give a shit about Mega Bloks they cater to LEGO, but they don't keep sets around very long because they rely on the fast return on investment. TRU has older products still, which might hurt them honestly, but if you can't afford something for a year or so you can at least maybe still find one at a TRU, unlike Wal-Mart who moves it out so fast it's gone before you know it and LEGO retires stuff constantly, without TRU or some smaller outlets you'd be left having to rely solely on the secondary market, meaning 3 times the cost for an item that only costs 25$ currently at retail.

Firstly your assuming a lot I shop on line mostly so toys r us going belly over means little as I have not done much shopping with them...i can remember the 80s and they still didn't carry full lines ...some things never even made it here as for baby's r us at least the stores I shopped at cut store in half and that selection wasn't any longer...
I get change of direction ..but they were a toy store........they also control what and how much they order not Hasbro or mattel and on that not yeh short shipped no stock just look at the daily you sighting what is Canadians are looking for thatsthat's been put on states for couple of months even on limited supply....again why I do business with fellow board members and places like but
. .lastly not saying wally the answer its not if there is a void and a dollar to be made some body or company will fill it and i dont care about lego

[justprime]

Imho of coarse

[chaingunsofdoom]

IMHO TRU won't be going anywhere. Close some US stores? Maybe after Christmas?

And yeah Consumer's Distributing was ahead of the curve for its time. Everyone always complained about filling out their paper form for a certain item and then it being OOS when you got up to the counter. That's how when you wanted an Autobot, you somehow ended-up with an Insecticon.

Walmart is just spotty with exclusives up here probably because they don't care. Besides missing the obvious Star Wars ones, I know there were others that did make it here: Marvel Legends 6" Falcon and Bucky. DC Multiverse 6" Suicide Squad Flag and Diablo. And I see now that they have JL Multiverse 6" Batman and Cyborg with Mother Boxes.

[79transam]

It always bothers me when TRU lists things I want on their site but it's not available. Then poof! It changes to not available online.
And the whole 5 per customer limit on new stuff? Hard to catch that late night 10 minute window before the scalpers get everything.
And why post a sale online if it's not available to online shoppers? That's just mean.
And why do I watch US sales on IG look like 10 dollar Vader 40th box sets and here we get 59.99 as a sale?
If they go under, I won't care

[Ironwave]

At least Target had a bigger toy section than Walmart does

[Pascal]

Really? The one in Sherbrooke was pretty lame.

[Tekkamanraiden]

Sound like they'll do some restructuring and need the lawyers to negotiate with some of their creditors. $300m in cash should keep them afloat while they reorganize.

I feel for the number of employees they're certainly going to layoff.