In a way, this post is redundant: having written my last post about the demise of Toys R Us in the UK looking certain it appeared that it would be impossible to buy Journey Girls in the UK in future. The news that all UK Toys R Us stores will close has confirmed this.
In a not entirely unexpected turn of events, Toys R Us are shutting all their US stores, with operations in other countries set to liquidate or be sold. Some of the news stories are saying that they will try to sell their 200 best performing stores along with some of their Canadian business.
If a buyer could be found then I suppose it might be possible that Journey Girls would continue, but any surviving business would be a much smaller company. I would guess that if a fragment of Toys R Us survives they won't be investing in this little corner of the 18" doll world. A quick search on Youtube shows how little presence the Journey Girls brand has in social media, compared to many new American Girl and Our Generation videos being uploaded regularly.
I have visited my local Toys R Us stores here in the UK in the last few weeks, and they were considerably busier, but just as scruffy and uninspiring as ever. Obviously during liquidation you expect stores to look picked over, but I don't remember Toys R Us ever being anything approaching tidy, even at quiet times. And though I will miss Journey Girls I won't miss the shopping experience - large, badly laid out stores with dated branding ('Teen Tronics' should have been ditched years ago) and unfortunately dirty toilets.
We are fortunate in the UK that we still have the Smyths chain of toy shops (stocking Battat products including Our Generation - look out for a future post about Smyths and other places to buy 18" dolls in the UK). Similar in some ways to Toys R Us, with out of town stores and a wide selection of products including bikes, Smyths stores are generally tidy, well laid out and a pleasure to shop in. What's more, they don't play annoying jingles every few minutes. I don't suppose anyone is going to miss "millions of toys all under one roof, it's called Toys R Us, Toys R Us, Toys R Us" - surely?
PS - I'm in Germany next week and hope I get chance to pop in to Toys R Us there. It doesn't look like there will be any things I can get there that I couldn't get in the UK, but I want to make the comparison while there is still chance. I will aim to report back!
