A toy store or toy shop is a type of retail business specializing in selling toys.
A toy store or toy shop is a type of retail business specializing in selling toys.
The first toy store was founded in 1760 by William Hamley in London, under the name of "Noah's Ark", later renamed to Hamleys. [1] [2] Set over seven floors, a Hamleys branch at 200 Regent Street in the West End of London opened in 1881. The famous toy store in New York City, FAO Schwarz, was founded under the name Schwarz Toy Bazaar. It was founded in 1862 by the German immigrant, Frederick August Otto Schwarz. [3] The former largest toy retailer in the United States, Toys "R" Us, started business in 1948 by Charles Lazarus, a veteran of World War II. [4] In 2015, FAO Schwarz closed, and did not reopen until after Toys "R" Us went bankrupt in 2018. [3]
Today, toy stores face competition from the online toy market. As a result, many large toy retailers have been rendered bankrupt. These competing websites include Amazon or eBay. Toys "R" Us cut prices in an attempt to compete, but it ultimately ended in failure. [4] As Jeff P. Bezos explained, "For a toy store to survive, they've got to create the kind of fun that Amazon can't." Toy Stores that adopt this model by increasing in-store interactivity have been more successful in maintaining business. Another model many stores have adopted is an online alternative, specifically for the individual retailer. [6]
There can be a large gender bias for the marketing of certain products. This includes using color to market products to a certain gender, or only showing one gender to market to that specific demographic. On the U.S. Disney Store website, the toys for boys are predominantly red, black, brown, or grey, while the toys for girls are mostly pink or purple. However, the toys meant for both boys and girls were mostly of the same color palette as the toys for boys. [7]
Retail is the sale of goods and services to consumers, in contrast to wholesaling, which is sale to business or institutional customers. A retailer purchases goods in large quantities from manufacturers, directly or through a wholesaler, and then sells in smaller quantities to consumers for a profit. Retailers are the final link in the supply chain from producers to consumers.
FAO Schwarz is an American toy brand and store. The company is known for its high-end toys, life-sized stuffed animals, interactive experiences, brand integrations, and games.
A grocery store (AE), grocery shop (BE) or simply grocery is a foodservice retail store that primarily retails a general range of food products, which may be fresh or packaged. In everyday U.S. usage, however, "grocery store" is a synonym for supermarket, and is not used to refer to other types of stores that sell groceries. In the UK, shops that sell food are distinguished as grocers or grocery shops.
Toys "R" Us is an American toy, clothing, and baby product retailer owned by Tru Kids and various others. The company was founded in 1957; its first store was built in April 1948, with its headquarters located in Parsippany-Troy Hills, New Jersey, in the New York metropolitan area.
Hamleys is a British multinational toy retailer, owned by Reliance Retail. Listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's oldest toy store, it was founded by William Hamley as "Noah's Ark" in High Holborn, London, in 1760. It moved to its current site on Regent Street in London's West End in 1881. This flagship store is set over seven floors, with more than 50,000 lines of toys on sale. It receives around five million visitors each year.
Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the retailer directly or by searching among alternative vendors using a shopping search engine, which displays the same product's availability and pricing at different e-retailers. As of 2020, customers can shop online using a range of different computers and devices, including desktop computers, laptops, tablet computers and smartphones.
The Grove is a retail and entertainment complex in Los Angeles, located on parts of the historic Farmers Market. The mall features Nordstrom and Barnes & Noble.
The Lego Group is a Danish construction toy production company based in Billund, Denmark. It manufactures Lego-branded toys, consisting mostly of interlocking plastic bricks. The Lego Group has also built several amusement parks around the world, each known as Legoland, and operates numerous retail stores.
K·B Toys was an American chain of mall-based retail toy stores. The company was founded in 1922 as Kaufman Brothers, a wholesale candy store. The company opened a wholesale toy store in 1946, and ended its candy wholesales two years later to emphasize its toy products. Retail sales began during the 1970s, using the name Kay-Bee Toy & Hobby.
Child World was an American toy retailer founded in 1962. It grew to 182 sites and revenues of $830 million before failing in 1992. It was known for the distinctive stylized castle store exterior adopted after its 1975 purchase of the Children's Palace store chain.
Right Start was a retailer of children's products. They began in 1985 as a catalog company, based out of Los Angeles. The company was founded by Stan Fridstein, Lenny Targon, and Harry Rosenthal who identified a growing market in young, first time parents who were looking for expertise and guidance in choosing high quality baby products. The company opened its first retail store in 1991, in Westlake Village, CA. In 1992, they began expanding, opening up their first location in a Rich's department store in Atlanta, Georgia.
Lego Friends is a product range of Lego construction toys designed primarily for girls that was launched in 2012. It introduced "mini-doll" figures, which are about the same size as traditional Lego minifigures but are more detailed and realistic. The original cast consisted of Andrea, Olivia, Stephanie, Mia and Emma. The theme was rebooted and relaunched in January 2023 to focus on a more diverse cast of characters, the main cast now consisting of Aliya, Nova, Zac, Liann, Paisley, Leo, Autumn and Olly.
Let Toys Be Toys is a campaign designed to persuade retailers to stop categorising toys by gender. It was started by a group of parents on the parenting on-line discussion forum Mumsnet.
Children's World or Detsky Mir is a Russian children's retailer. Founded in June 1957, as of March 2022, the company had 1125 stores. It is the largest children's goods retailer in Russia and the CIS, with the retail chain in Russia, as well as in Belarus and Kazakhstan. In February 2017, PAO Detsky Mir listed its shares in an initial public offering. Maria Davydova is the CEO.
Retail apocalypse refers to the closing of numerous brick-and-mortar retail stores, especially those of large chains, beginning around 2010 and accelerating due to the mandatory closures during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Tru Kids, Inc. is an American retail and licensing company that operates the Toys "R" Us locations in the United States. Although they only operate locations in the United States, they own the Toys R Us brand internationally. It was established on January 20, 2019 after its lenders cancelled the bankruptcy auction and took over the Toys "R" Us intellectual property in October 2018.
Fourways Mall is a shopping mall in South Africa located in the Fourways area of Sandton, in suburban Johannesburg. It doubled its size, from 85,000m² to 178,000m², relaunching in 2019
The retail format influences the consumer's store choice and addresses the consumer's expectations. At its most basic level, a retail format is a simple marketplace, that is; a location where goods and services are exchanged. In some parts of the world, the retail sector is still dominated by small family-run stores, but large retail chains are increasingly dominating the sector, because they can exert considerable buying power and pass on the savings in the form of lower prices. Many of these large retail chains also produce their own private labels which compete alongside manufacturer brands. Considerable consolidation of retail stores has changed the retail landscape, transferring power away from wholesalers and into the hands of the large retail chains.
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