A new shopping option is coming for expectant parents and their friends and relatives: Babies R Us is preparing for a comeback in Manchester, Plainville and Norwalk.
Six years after the iconic brand disappeared, it will be appearing as a mini-shop inside 200 Kohl’s stores around the country including three Connecticut outlets.
The Wisconsin-based Kohl’s chain isn’t giving an exact timeline for when the Babies R Us sections will appear, but is telling shoppers that it will happen before the holiday season.
“The Babies R Us at Kohl’s shop will feature a curated assortment of the latest baby gear, furniture, activity, accessories, and more,” Kohl’s said in its announcement this week.
“Adjacent to the shop, customers will find the best of Kohl’s existing baby and kids’ apparel and other offerings from brands like Little Co. by Lauren Conrad, Jumping Beans, Carters, Nike, and more,” the company said.
Kohl’s is limiting the rollout to 200 of the roughly 1,100 stores it operates in 49 states, with about a third of the Babies R Us shops targeted for the Northeast. In addition to the three in Connecticut, the chain will open 25 in New York, 13 in New Jersey, 13 in Massachusetts, nine in Pennsylvania and two each in Rhode Island and New Hampshire.
Kohl’s is banking on the Babies R Us name to bring more shoppers into its department stores and onto its online shopping site. It’s working in conjunction with WHP Global, a New York-based brand acquisition and management firm that purchased the Babies R Us and Toys R Us brands after the Toys R Us bankruptcy and liquidation in 2018.
The baby apparel market was shaken when Toys R Us, a one-time retail powerhouse, shut its stores along with its those of its Babies R Us subsidiary. At one time, Babies R Us operated locations in at least four Connecticut communities: West Hartford, Milford, Manchester and Danbury.
Last year, Forbes magazine described how WHP was working to bring back the Toys R Us brand in the United States.
“WHP focused less on rolling out numerous stores, and concentrated on spreading the message that ‘Toys R Us is back,’ ” it said.
WHP resurrected the website for online ordering, opened a flagship stand-alone Toys R Us store in New Jersey, and most recently partnered with Macy’s to create Toys R Us in-store shops at more than 450 Macy’s locations.
Meanwhile, Chain Store Age reported that Kohl’s has gotten some sales growth by creating in-store shops in a different field.
“Kohl’s in-store partnership with Babies R Us comes as the retailer has had success with its Sephora in-store partnership. As of the end of 2023, the Sephora at Kohl’s fleet had reached more than 900 stores. The shops feature an curated assortment of top beauty products in makeup, skin and hair, and are located at the front of the store,” the magazine said.
Kohl’s reported that has been bringing in new customers and building year-to-year sales in the beauty segment.
Whether that translates to the baby products field won’t be known until 2025.
“It will be difficult for Kohl’s to take share from competitors like Amazon and Target. While Babies R Us is a familiar brand and adding a lot of new merchandise will help, Kohl’s has struggled to generate store traffic for years and it’s not clear that this effort will change that very much,” Morningstar Research senior analyst David Swartz told The Courant on Thursday.
“The baby category has been tough, as evidenced by the difficulties at the old Toys R Us/Babies R Us and at Buy Buy Baby,” Swartz noted.
Almost immediately after Babies R Us vanished, competitor buybuyBaby posted a message on its website proclaiming “We’re here to stay. Shop with confidence!”
But within a few years, that chain, too, had tanked under the failure of a corporate owner, Bed Bath & Beyond. The buybuyBaby operation shut down all its stores by early 2023, but new owners acquired the brand and have opened 11 locations including one in West Hartford, the single Connecticut location.
If Kohl’s new deal with Babies R Us succeeds, it could be expanded to more of the chain’s stores, possibly including the 17 in Connecticut behind Manchester, Plainville and Norwalk.
“I expect that Kohl’s probably will roll it out to more stores since 200 stores is less than 20% of its store base. If it seems to be working at all, it’s probably worth expanding,” Swartz said. “Kohl’s has the floor space to do it, and it needs to do something to differentiate itself from others like Macy’s and JCPenney.”
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