Toy stores
Toy retail consolidated twice: first into category-killer superstores, then into Walmart, Target and Amazon. The chains here were casualties of one wave or the other, and in most cases of the debt put on them along the way.
Post-mortems in Toy stores
Toys “R” Us
1957 – 2018
The store that invented the toy superstore was still selling $11.5 billion of toys a year when it failed. Nearly every dollar it earned from operations went to interest on its own buyout.
KB Toys
1922 – 2009
The toy store in the mall. It had 1,322 stores when Walmart started selling the season’s hottest toys below cost, and a buyout that had already taken about $120 million out.
Kiddie City
1957 – 1993
The company that made Lionel trains sold the trains and kept the toy stores. It went through Chapter 11 twice in nine years trying to keep up with Toys “R” Us.