Feasibly they could. I mean KB made the announcement a while back and was possibly planning this even further back. I kinda see it being in locations like the little Mall Stalls. Or maybe renting a temporary place like Spirit Halloween does every year.
LOL solicited back in March 2018 and heard nothing since....no job postings anywhere on major job networks either. Guys KB is not coming back this year. They would be here already and hiring
So when it doesn't happen, you'll admit that you're wrong?? Hiring season is now...not a couple days before black friday especialy getting ready to re-open a store. Have you worked in retail before or in any kind a management??
Sure, I'll admit they missed their mark. But your hiring season remark holds no water because the businesses hiring have actual stores for the employees to come work at.
Where are these actual KB toy stores your talking about or actual jobs? They don't exist! You have not worked retail,I can tell.
I'm connected to the owner on Linkedin and had reached out about store manager / district manager level positions. So far all he ever posts about is a lawsuit his Hydrox brand has against Nabisco. Nothing on any of the jobs boards and in talking with friends who are management with Simon Malls (the supposed partner in bringing KB back) they had no knowledge and weren't saving any vacancies for a KB return. By this point I'd think at least district level management, possibly even store managers and leases would need to be in place for a mid October to early November launch. There doesn't appear to be any infrastructure in place at this point. Not a great sign at this point.
Ok, but do you have any links of articles written since those early rumors at the beginning of the year with something actually definite? Or seen credible sources that are not Wikipedia articles about an actual business model or plan beyond "we bought the name Kay Bee, now we're gonna open a store and save toys!"? Because I sure haven't. The only info out there is just the same stuff that was being discussed way back before spring, which should fill no one with any optimism of them being operational by November. Maybe, but do you honestly believe that in this case it will? They probably would be smaller mall stores, but the thing is those temporary Christmas stores are usually up and running by time Halloween is over. I mean I'm sure Party City has already begun getting in 4th quarter product by now, so I'm confident their plans for those 100 or whatever Toy City stores will be ready by November. But Kay Bee? If they are up and ready to move in by November 1st, they'd have a chance. But we gotta be real, I'll believe it when I see it.
It will be a nightmare for both employees and customers if KB opens on black friday with new everything. People are already in a hostile mood. Add poorly/rushed trained employees with mandatory new system glitches and 'not all there yet' stock.... YIKES.
I've said in the other thread as well. If they were going to be successfully up by this Christmas we would have already gotten word. There would be some infrastructure. It takes a lot of logistical time to set up distribution centers, arrange inventory / fixturing / signage / leases being in place / upper level management...and thus far we've seen none of that. Frankly for stores that should project to open mid October to early November for best effect we should have seen a lot more tangible effort by this point. My local Simon mall, which was supposed to be their financial partner in this, doesn't seem to be clearing any space for a KB pop up and the mall manager (a friend of mine) hasn't heard anything about it since May and figured it all fell through. Spirit and other Halloween places start their recruiting in July so they can be fully staffed in August to set up stores. None of the jobs boards have a hint of KB (and this is coming from someone who was looking for a new job for the last month and a half, checking those job boards every day...and starting my training as a Walmart assistant manager on Monday!).
Hell one of my local Halloween cities has been dual branded with toy city since it opened this season, though I doubt they’ve got toys yet
Finally, some sense! They are not up and won't be up because they are not opening this year. Where do you get your information that KB is working to get them up? I am job searching and see Nothing Kaybee! And if they are hiring,then jobs would be already posted to make way for the black friday hiring deadline. Some of you guys think this is some simple backyard yard sale where you can prepare a week in advanced and then start selling. It doesn't work like that in Retail business.
Fair point. I kinda expect them to be up and running next holiday season tbh. Because KB said they want to get pop up stores going by Christmas.
The clues about KB coming back would have already been given. I've done toy ordering for the holidays, I've done big box logistics and management. Orders for the holiday season get placed in May...Mattel / Hasbro etc investor calls would likely have mentioned their orders and re-emergence into the market to help boost shareholder confidence, especially while bemoaning the hit to profitability due to the loss of TRU. Right now there would have to be warehouses ready and staffed, waiting to receive and send out product and fixtures. What POS system are they using? management should already be trained on it so they can train their staff. Things would be well in motion right now and there's no way it would be all kept silent. It's easier for a company like Spirit, who shares it's warehousing and distribution with Spencers Gifts...or Toy City which has Party City's infrastructure to use...to slide a pop up store under the radar. KB is it's own thing and the logistics will become a nightmare if they try and cut too close to the wire. From a retail perspective, it was an ambitious plan, but it's simply too late in the game for them to be up this year.
This is true. Having worked for Spirit and their Transitions into Toyzams, by November 6th all the stores are closed and the mall stores they have that turn, or turned(Not sure if they do the Holiday toy store thing anymore.) into Toyzams have started the conversion process by this time. Overall, the conversion process doesn't take long on a per store basis, so long as you have intelligent people there and they know what they're doing and can follow the book. I imagine new KB's if they're only going to be a seasonal thing might use the grid system Mall Spirits do for when they turn into Toyzams. Can have aisles and walls up pretty quick. Getting the toys, is where I'd have to wonder how that will work. But there may be some back leftover infrastructure from the old KB days. I hope KB comes back, I was wanting to work there again, as I had worked at it for a few years before the company filed for Bankruptcy(We all joked that when the last of what we called the original store crew left, our store would die. Coincidentally, that's more or less what happened. I was the last to part with the company and then the next year my store closed.). Personally I hope Toys'r'us comes back, but I sense that's going to be in Franchise form, and I have to wonder how they'll deal the stock out to those stores. It feels like a potential mess of a system, but I'd honestly welcome any toy store to come about to be open year round.
I think franchising will be better for TRU as then, economically, the load is handled across franchisers instead of a single corporate entity which could be exploited exactly like what Bain Capital did. Plus, that would also mean individual stores would have different distribution behaviors which if anything would be a massive improvement. How they're going to get the STOCK is another question, since places like Ollie's have literally metric tons of unsold TRU stock in their stores. The one closest to me legit still had entire boxes overloaded with stuff and the store's chief manager herself was still unpacking, mentioning that there were ten more palletes (basically twice the size of a mini-van) in the back that needed to be unpacked and put on the shop floor. I doubt Ollie's is going to sell that stuff BACK to a new TRU.
