Toys'R'Us In Crazy Holiday Push

Toys”R”Us is pulling out all the stops this holiday season in efforts to compete with the likes of Walmart and others that have encroached on its territory for a while. The chain’s solution? A pop-up and store-within-a-store strategy.Not satisfied that shoppers will gravitate toward the 586 stores across the US that it operates, Toys is opening about 350 pop-up locations in high-profile malls over the holidays. Earlier this week, the company announced another initiative, the FAO Schwarz brand, which it bought in May, will open store-within-store boutiques at all of its locations. Toys definitely needs to turn things around over the holidays. Same-store sales in its most recent quarter fell 7.2% year over year. And we assume that those figures don’t tell the whole picture, as they’re combined with the 260-unit Babies”R”Us chain, which does much better by most accounts.Will the increased visibility of the pop ups and the popular FAO brand give Toys the extra push it needs over the holidays, or do discounters already have this one wrapped up?