Toys R Us plays catch- up with its website

Retailer revamping its e- commerce after years of lagging peers

While Toys R Us was minding the store, it admits that it fell behind on e- commerce. Now the company is taking action in a bid to make up for it.

At a time when shoppers increasingly browse online and head to a store just to close the deal, Toys R Us is announcing Monday that it is revamping its website to woo back customers who may have fled to Amazon or other retail rivals.

The toy giant’s new site will debut to a small number of users before a full rollout that is expected by early July. The revamp is part of a nearly $ 100 million investment by Toys R Us over the past three years that is geared toward jump- starting an e- commerce experience that it acknowledges lagged some of its retail peers.

“The website really represents the front door of our brand,’’ said Lance Wills, Toys R Us’ first global chief technology officer, who noted that more than 60% of the company’s customers visit its website before deciding to go to an actual store. “In a year to two years, we have to catch up on 10 years of innovation, and that’s no small feat.’’

That was a deficit the toy chain could ill afford when 15.1% of retail sales, not counting gas stations, car dealerships, groceries and restaurants, occurred online in the last quarter of 2016, according to the financial information services and analytics firm IHS Markit. Last year, the company’s same- store sales, an industry measurement that excludes revenue from newer locations, fell 1.4%. And in the fourth quarter, which includes the benefit of holiday sales, same- store sales dropped 3%.

“Some organizations recognize faster than others there are shifts in the ways customers want to be communicated with and the way customers want to purchase products,’’ says Toys R Us CEO David Brandon. “It probably took us a while.”

The makeover means that instead of constantly clicking through choices, customers can tap once on a category like “dolls” or “bicycles” and be led to a finetuned list. Checkout for basic purchases will shrink from at least five steps to two. And for the first time, visitors to the baby registry will get notifications alerting them to a sale on bottle warmers or a stroller recall.

Retailers of all stripes are fighting to compete with online powerhouse Amazon, but for Toys R Us, chains like Target and Walmart have also become fierce competitors.

“We view anyone who sells toys ... to be a competitor,’’ Brandon says.

ROBERT DEUTSCH, USA TODAY The new Toys R Us website should roll out by early July.