It Wasn't Amazon: What Really Killed Toys "R" Us

Toys "R" Us is opening 120 new stores. Eight years ago it closed all 735 of its American stores. Most people blame Amazon. The company's own filings tell a different story: a 2005 leveraged buyout that loaded it with almost $6 billion of debt and around $400 million a year in interest. 0:00 Intro 0:57 The supermarket for toys 2:27 The giant gets caught 4:01 The deal 5:10 Four hundred million a year 6:57 The exit that never came 7:35 The holiday that never came 9:11 The other side 10:33 The comeback Sources Toys "R" Us annual reports (SEC Form 10-K), fiscal 2005, 2007, 2015, 2016: https://www.sec.gov/cgi-bin/browse-ed... Fortune, Charles Lazarus obituary (Mar 22, 2018): https://fortune.com/2018/03/22/charle... AP via Deseret News, "Toys R Us dethroned as nation's biggest toy retailer by Wal-Mart" (Mar 30, 1999) NBC News on the Amazon ruling (Mar 2006): https://www.nbcnews.com/id/11641703 Fortune, "Toys 'R' Us cancels IPO" (Mar 29, 2013) Reuters via Fox Business, "How $5B debt caught up to toy retailer" (Sept 20, 2017) CNN Business, "Amazon didn't kill Toys 'R' Us. Here's what did" (Mar 15, 2018) Retail Dive, "Lawmakers want answers in the death of Toys R Us" (Jul 9, 2018) Bisnow, "Lawmakers Take Private Equity To Task Over Toys R Us Doom" (Jul 9, 2018) Today's General Counsel, bankruptcy professional fees (May 14, 2018) AP, KKR and Bain $20 million fund for former workers (Nov 2018) NBC News, the Sora-generated brand film (Jun 26, 2024) Fox Business, 120 new stores (Sept 17, 2026) AI tools helped write the script, and the narration is a synthetic voice. Every fact was checked against the sources above. Logos are trademarks of their owners, shown for identification. Photos: Wikimedia Commons contributors (93 photos, licences listed at commons.wikimedia.org). Stock video: Mixkit. Music: Risen - Density & Time; False Vacuum Decay - The Grey Room / Density & Time; The Last Oasis - The Grey Room / Density & Time; On The Eve - The Grey Room / Density & Time; Rubberband - The Grey Room / Density & Time; Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly - The Grey Room / Density & Time; The Road To Mordor - Ezra Lipp; Kayak - The Grey Room / Density & Time; Pulsar - The Grey Room / Density & Time; Singularity - The Grey Room / Density & Time; Level - The Grey Room / Density & Time (YouTube Audio Library).