What Happened to Toys R Us? It Wasn't Amazon

What happened to Toys R Us? In its last full year before bankruptcy, the stores earned $460 million in operating profit, and the company paid $457 million in interest. Almost every dollar went to a loan that had been used to buy the company itself. Toys R Us started in 1948 as Charles Lazarus's baby furniture store, Children's Bargain Town, and became the biggest toy store in the world. This is the story of Geoffrey the giraffe, the category killer, the 2000 Amazon exclusive deal and the lawsuit Toys R Us actually won, the 2005 $6.6 billion leveraged buyout by Bain Capital, KKR and Vornado, twelve years of $400-500 million interest bills, the 2017 Chapter 11 filing, the 2018 liquidation that cost 33,000 jobs, and the brand's revival attempts since. CHAPTERS 0:00 It made money, and still went bankrupt 1:15 Charles Lazarus and Children's Bargain Town, 1948 5:14 Walmart, Target and the category killer 6:11 The Amazon deal and the lawsuit 8:19 The 2005 leveraged buyout 12:05 Twelve years of interest 13:15 The numbers from the last annual reports 14:39 Bankruptcy, 2017 16:55 The liquidation, 2018 17:34 Everything must go 19:34 The brand that would not die 20:52 What really killed Toys R Us IMAGE CREDITS Photos: Wikimedia Commons (Creative Commons and public domain), including U.S. military public domain photos. Photographers: 100cellsman, 3steph14, A.sostika, Aaron F. Stone, Acroterion, Andy C, Deans Charbal, Dillan Payne, Doug Kerr, Dough4872, DoulosBen, Elvert Barnes, Glenn Samonte, Hassocks5489, Ian S, Infrogmation of New Orleans, Jaime Lopez, JJBers, Joris van Rooden, Keizers, Kidfly182, Larry Hachucka, Laura Northrup, Mack Male, Marine 69-71, Michael Rivera, Mike Kalasnik, Mike Mozart, MiracleMiles, NewYorker1999, Nicholas Eckhart, Otisfrog, Phillip Pessar, Random Retail, Rhododendrites, Roc0ast3r, SounderBruce, Talor Berthelson, TaurusEmerald, Tdorante10, Timothy Holdiness, TomasEE, Tony Webster, Windyshadow32, Xnatedawgx. #ToysRUs #WhatHappenedToToysRUs #RetailHistory #Geoffrey #DefunctStores #BusinessHistory #RetailApocalypse #PrivateEquity #LeveragedBuyout #Nostalgia #Amazon #DeadMalls