All Remaining Toys “R” Us Stores In The U.S. To Close Friday

All 200 remaining Toys “R” Us stores in the United States are closing Friday.

Toys “R” Us filed for bankruptcy in September in hopes of turning around. But terrible Christmas sales left it on life support. The chain had 735 US stores when it announced plans to go out of business in March.

The 70-year old company will continue in some other countries, such as Canada.

Back in 2016, Toys "R" Us announced it was closing its Tulsa store on East 21st Street in January 2017.

12/28/2016 Related Story: Toys R Us, Sears To Each Close One Of Their Tulsa Stores

Its other Tulsa store, in the 6900 block of South Memorial Drive, remained open until it too was closed.

In addition to competition from big box retailers and online rivals like Amazon, Toys “R” Us was doomed by an unsustainable debt load that came in the wake of being taken private by KKR, Bain Capital and real estate firm Vornado in 2005.

Some longtime employees have been staging protests because they were not paid severance after losing their jobs. The 31,000 US workers received only 60-days notice as required by federal law. 

Big box retailers such as Walmart and Target had already surpassed Toys “R” Us in total toy sales, but the chain was an important place for toy makers to sell their full line of products. Both Hasbro and Mattel reported lost sales of tens of millions each in the first quarter because of the Toys “R” Us closings, according to the companies.

Toys “R” Us said it is in the process of trying to find new tenants for its stores.