|
Re: Toys"R"Us Has Record Losses in 2013
I'm kind of not that surprised honestly.
They overcharge on exclusive items more often than not, sit on products at full price far too long (Meaning a loss of considerable sales when you look at half the crap they leave up from year to year.) and they tend to have really crappy customer service when it comes to the staffing of cashiers. I have consistently seen only one cashier available during peak business hours, leaving long lines and frustrated shoppers.
In the states I understand they really overcharge on all their LEGO Products. Not so much here more often than not, but down in the US they seem to be ten to fifteen dollars above MSRP for US Prices. (Making them almost closer to CND MSRP Prices some of the time.)
Their online presence is a bit of a hit or miss situation as well. I've only used their service once honestly, and the deals for online shipping are practically non-existent compared to Amazon where Free is Free and you only have to spend 25$ to get Free Shipping Options.
We in Canada get a lot more % off sales over the year, so that tends to bring in more customers. Still, that being said, in the States they rarely have any markdowns on popular items. And even in Canada I have not once seen them put the very popular top selling LEGO Friends line on sale like their other Themes.
They constantly seem to change up their store shelving, cram way too much stuff into certain areas that are cramped and confined. The action figure section is farther back in the store while they have the boardgames and other non-essential items closer to the front. I don't know how often people actually go to Toy's-R-Us for bikes, or big ticket items like that, but I see more people buying LEGO and other children's toys compared to Bikes.
And the Baby's-R-Us side of the store is a joke, I rarely see anybody going in there.
Honestly I think Toy's-R-Us needs to rejuvenate their core brand marketing, when they started off with that crappy Baby's-R-Us ploy it might have sounded like a good idea and all that, but honestly to me Toy's-R-Us has always been about big box wholesale selling of Toys. Something that stores like Wal-Mart and Target can't really compete in too broadly because they don't focus on just selling one product and so don't have the space to keep large stock of products.
All I know is, if they go the way of Sears and The Bay or Zellers it's going to be a bear and a half getting any kind of Masterpiece or other Store Exclusives in Canada. Wal-Mart is not interested, Target doesn't seem to want to play, and there are no other retail outlets for such things.
I hope this isn't a warning sign of the downfall of the biggest remaining toy seller for a retail presence, but I'm honestly not surprised at a drop in sales. (Look at all the mark-up they apply to some of their exclusive Star Wars stuff for pity's sake.)
|
