July 13, 2018

Two weeks ago, on June 29, 2018, the last Toys “R” Us stores (often written as Toys Я Us) closed in the United States. The once giant toy retailer met its end after seven decades of providing parents with seemingly limitless options and making millions of children “Toys Я Us kids.” Online and mass market competition eventually squeezed out the familiar store franchise, which filed for bankruptcy protection in late 2017. Early in 2018, Toys Я Us announced the planned liquidation of its stores in the United Kingdom and the United States. Some 1,000 international locations remain open, however, as the company struggles to divide and sell off its once great empire.

The last Toys Я Us stores closed in the United States on June 29, 2018. Credit: © Jax10289/Shutterstock

The origins of Toys Я Us go back to 1948, when 25-year-old U.S. Army veteran Charles Lazarus opened a store called Children’s Bargain Town in Washington, D.C. Lazarus ran the store himself, selling cribs, strollers, and other baby furniture and necessities. Fueled by the post World War II baby boom, Lazarus soon expanded his business to include games and toys for slightly older kids. The business grew, and Lazarus expanded further to create a supermarket-type atmosphere with aisles, shopping carts, and customer self-service. In 1957, he opened his first store dedicated only to toys and games: Toys Я Us—with a backwards R to appear as if a child had incorrectly written it. Parents—and kids, of course—loved the giant toy store, and Toys Я Us locations soon opened all over the United States.

In 1965, the store’s giraffe mascot, Geoffrey, began appearing at new store openings and other promotional events. Geoffrey starred in his first television commercial in 1973, and a popular advertising jingle soon expressed children’s wishes to never grow up and remain “Toys Я Us kids.” By the 1980′s, Toys Я Us fully dominated the U.S. toy market and had stores around the world. Specialty branches of Toys Я Us opened as Kids Я Us (selling children’s clothing) and Babies Я Us.

Charles Lazarus stepped down as chief executive officer of the company in 1994, but remained as chairman emeritus (retired) until 1998—an inauspicious year for Toys Я Us as Wal-Mart surpassed the company in toy sales for the first time. Despite efforts to counter the loss in market share to Wal-Mart and such retail titans as Target and Amazon, Toys Я Us steadily declined and last posted a profit in 2013. Lazarus died at age 94 on March 22, 2018.

Toys Я Us was the biggest toy store in the United States, but it was not the oldest. That honor belongs to the still-running FAO Schwarz, which dates back to 1862. Toys Я Us bought FAO Schwarz in 2009, but sold the high-end toy company in 2016.

December 30, 2015

Did you or someone you know get a “hoverboard” for the holidays? Although they don’t actually hover, these devices allow users to glide along on two wheels with ease, performing sharp turns and quick stops, and cruising at over 10 miles (15 kilometers) per hour. Their popular name (and possibly the inspiration for the devices themselves) may come from Robert Zemeckis’s 1990 film Back to the Future Part II. In the film, which is set mostly in the year 2015, protagonist Marty McFly zooms around on a device resembling a floating skateboard. Although personal transportation technology hasn’t quite reached the level predicted in the movie, “hoverboard” users today can feel as cool as McFly as they cruise their neighborhood.

Hoverboard Scooter. Credit: Soar Boards (licensed under cc by 2.0)

Despite (or because of) their novelty, there has been some backlash against “hoverboards” in recent months. They have been banned from streets and sidewalks in some municipalities and countries. Many airlines refuse to allow them on their planes. One of the reasons for the bans is that some cheaper models have been reported to burst into flames, probably because of poorly constructed lithium-ion batteries. Government agencies are looking into the safety of such devices, for fire risk as well as for their tendency to buck riders and cause injuries when they do not work properly.

Although these “hoverboards” do not actually hover, inventors have already created some prototypes that do. Some use supercooled magnets to generate a magnetic field, causing the board to float. These hoverboards must be used on special metallic surfaces in order to function, however. Other designs use fans to create a cushion of air on which the board floats. These designs can be used over any terrain, but their fast-spinning blades could be extremely dangerous to the rider and bystanders in the case of an accident.

At some level, both kinds of true hoverboards suffer from the same problem that many of the cheaper “hoverboard” brands have: poor batteries. The magnets of magnetic-field-based hoverboards must be extremely cold, so current prototypes require constant replenishment of liquid nitrogen or powerful refrigeration units. Fans require large amounts of energy to hold up a person. Therefore, both types can only float for a few minutes before they need to be recharged. Simply adding more batteries doesn’t improve their range, either: additional batteries make a board heavier, so it needs more fans or magnets to stay afloat. These devices then use more energy, requiring still more batteries. Only improvements in motor and battery efficiency may allow us to one day really hover along like Marty McFly.

Other World Book articles: 

• Invention
• Back to the Future (is Now) (Oct. 21, 2015) – A Behind the Headlines article
• New Currents in Battery Technology – A Special Report
• Toy (2000) – A Back in Time article
• Transportation (2001) – A Back in Time article

December 2, 2014

For the first time in 11 years, Barbie has been bumped from her number-one spot on an annual list of toys for girls that parents plan to buy this holiday season. Taking her place are dolls and other merchandise linked to Frozen (2013), the most successful animated film in history. The list, the Holiday Top Toy Survey, has been compiled since 2003 by the National Retail Federation (NRF), an organization that represents retailers in the United States and 45 other countries. According to the NRF, 20 percent of parents surveyed said they planned to buy Frozen dolls or another of the more than 300 items in that line, compared with 17 percent who reported plans to buy Barbie dolls and related merchandise.

The Barbie doll, the top-ranked toy for girls on an annual retailers’ list, has been overtaken by Anna and Elsa, the princesses of Arendelle. (© Robin Beckham, BEEP Stock/Alamy Images)

Frozen, produced by the Walt Disney Company, is loosely based on the fairy tale “The Snow Queen,” by Danish writer Hans Christian Andersen. In the movie, a princess named Anna braves a difficult journey through snowy mountains to find her sister, Princess Elsa, who has accidentally trapped their kingdom in eternal winter. The film earned more than $1.3 billion in ticket sales worldwide.

The number-one toy for boys on the survey was LEGO construction sets.