My grandmother used to take me to Toys R Us for my birthday every year for exactly this reason — she didn't want to guess what I wanted, she wanted to watch me choose. Walking around that store and seeing what the toys looked like in person was something I looked forward to for days. You can't recreate that with an Amazon wishlist.
The death of the brick and mortar toy store
101–110 of 256 posts
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#102Does the article mention that private equity killed off the still-profitable Toys R Us?
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#103I live in a town of fewer than 8k people. Our local toy store is not only thriving, it’s central to the community. People would rather shop there than go online. Why? Because they are a part of the community. At every farmer’s market or community event they have a booth giving out free glitter tattoos to children, and they employ several teenagers part time to wrap gifts (of course this is free too), apply tattoos, a…
It would be great to have a "rural revival" where it's worthwhile to go back to the howling old owl in the woods, hunting the horny back toad. Maybe the wave of AI layoffs can actually make that happen. We would need a visionary planner like maybe Christopher Alexander and then an administration to deeply care and support such a development. I suspect if I were forced to make such a move, I'd be initially very upset,…
The united states could spark a rural revival like you're talking about with investment into the healthcare and education infrastructure in those communities. That's what other countries do to prop up the rural economy- the steady lifelong jobs created for all the people who work at the schools, clinics, the library, provide an economic base for the town.
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#104There is a really cool place in Denver called Wizard’s Chest. I think they make good money off costumes, but also Warhammer 4k (and to a related lesser extent DnD). Nice people, too.
It's Warhammer 40k. But beware, this game is designed to suck your wallet dry! ;)
"Get your kids addicted to M:TG so they'll never have enough money for drugs" - good advice from a coworker of mine
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#105The DreamLand bit seems off:
> DreamLand: another toy store chain with venerable Belgian roots owned by Colruyt group that briefly had a fancy underground store near a new parking lot not even five years ago. Of course it had to go. […] The bigger store about 30 km away from us recently also closed down. The store chain is still alive as is their webshop, but for how long… There’s still a DreamLand nearby but no longer in the centre.
DreamLand actually grew significantly in terms of physical stores due to their merger with ToyChamp, and is present in both the Netherlands and Belgium now. Of course, these huge (for European standards) stores tend to be located in malls and such; not in the historic city centres where toy stores used to be.
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#106I own a reasonably well performing indie bookstore. I've noticed for the model to work you need a critical mass of other local shops clustered to make the trip an experience for families and diverse tastes. My working theory is that three of such small businesses are sufficient and could operate well with a common inventory strategy and manager (e.g. a bookstore, a toy store, and a tea or candy shop...nothing that sp…
kids don't want to browse amazon. =)
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
The thing I've noticed is that even dying downtowns want insane amounts of rent; I think you have to be able to buy the building to make it work. However, that's not as unrealistic as it may seem, because the city itself often owns a decent amount of downtown, and can make a deal.
A Georgist LVT would fix that is short order. Start making owners pay compensation for keeping a valuable space empty and crumbling, and you'll see them step to it pretty quickly or sell it to someone who does.
If it's empty and crumbling, I doubt it's all that valuable to be repurposed for housing or anything else. I did note the other day in the very small downtown of a nearby minor city that the the ancient travel agent is now a party supply store. But, really, there's not a lot in that downtown.
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#108I own a reasonably well performing indie bookstore. I've noticed for the model to work you need a critical mass of other local shops clustered to make the trip an experience for families and diverse tastes. My working theory is that three of such small businesses are sufficient and could operate well with a common inventory strategy and manager (e.g. a bookstore, a toy store, and a tea or candy shop...nothing that sp…
I'd be curious to know if you consider a Lego store a "toy store". There's one that opened in my city fairly recently and is in an area of smaller boutique shops (kind of like what you described).
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#109I own a reasonably well performing indie bookstore. I've noticed for the model to work you need a critical mass of other local shops clustered to make the trip an experience for families and diverse tastes. My working theory is that three of such small businesses are sufficient and could operate well with a common inventory strategy and manager (e.g. a bookstore, a toy store, and a tea or candy shop...nothing that sp…
I have seen bookstore (second-handed books) thriving near universities. Your idea is actually very interesting and remind me of the mall model -- the mall model worked because everyone in the family gets his/her own share of pleasure. Of course the traffic matters a lot, too. Hope you start that experiment soon and succeed!
The general theory of most malls was that you had anchor stores. My local one has a couple of stores adjacent to the mall (a local chain supermarket and and Home Depot) that are very busy, almost too much so. The mall itself is pretty much dead and has been on the market for ages. The anchor stores--JCPenney, Sears, and Macy's are all long gone. Haven't been in the actual mall in ages but I assume it's pretty sad and there seem very few cars in the lots.
Oh, yeah, the Toys 'R Us in the complex is long gone too.
Re: The death of the brick and mortar toy store
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
> devastating for someone with a loan Sorry, I can't understand why. Could you please expand a bit? I don't get how decreasing the value of the building makes the loan more difficult to repay.
Loan to Value (LTV) is a percentage that tells you how safe a loan is. You divide the amount of the loan by the value of the building. So if I buy a building for 10 million with a 6 million loan and 4 million of my own money then I have an LTV of 60%. This means if I go bankrupt then the bank can sell the building and get its money back. If the value of the building halves because the rent halved then I have a 6 mill…
Don't forget that long term the current downturn is likely to end and so I will again be able to get the rent in a few years if I can just hold on for these bad years.