Toys R Us Opens New Flagship Store 5 Years After Shutting Down
After a half-decade-long shutdown littered with several attempts at re-opening, Toys R Us is officially back with a brand-new flagship store.
gamerant.com
After a five-year shutdown, Toys R Us is back with a new flagship store. Toys R Us filed for bankruptcy back in 2017, and the subsequent half-decade has been quite the roller-coaster ride for the nostalgic toy store.
Less than a year after filing for bankruptcy, Toys R Us announced it would be closing down all US stores. Despite that fact, the chain attempted to rebound later that same year. However, the retailer's return has mostly been limited to toy shops within Macy's department stores. Now, it appears as though the store might finally be making its full-fledged comeback.
Just in time for the big holiday shopping season push, Toys R Us has opened up a new flagship store in the Mall of America. The store celebrated its grand opening this past Friday inside the US' largest mall in Minnesota. The store itself measures in at more than 11,000 square feet, with an in-store cafe and ice cream parlor reportedly coming next year. Additionally, the store has plans for product demos and other various interactive elements. Essentially, the new-look Toys R Us promises to both be an experience and a place to shop for the season's hottest toys.
The latest Mall of America location is actually the second store in the Toys R Us comeback tour. The first store is a 20,000-square-foot behemoth inside the American Dream Mall in New Jersey. The New Jersey location does feature an ice cream parlor and, also, a two-story slide. For those hoping for even more locations of the nostalgic retailer, Toys R Us is planning to launch even more flagship stores as early as next year.
While Toys R Us has historically been a great place to get action figures and LEGO sets, the store has generally been a solid spot to find video games. That said, the rise in digital sales has hurt the physical media industry. Earlier this year, a new report found that physical sales of video games are down substantially, and it doesn't appear as though things are turning around for discs and cartridges.
While the official Toys R Us website is advertising Black Friday deals, the retailer isn't offering much in the way of video games online. It's unclear whether the store is abandoning carrying video games altogether, but with some major retailers moving away from physical media, it wouldn't come as too much of a surprise. Gamers have certainly taken notice of recent trends moving away from physical media, as one shared image shows a down-sized Xbox section at Target.
