Iconic toy store FAO Schwarz returns with dance-on piano
FAO Schwarz is ready for its close up. The iconic retailer will open its new store in Rockefeller Plaza on Friday, three years after it shut its previous flagship.
The store will be a combination of the old and the new, bringing back FAO’s giant clock tower – whose face will welcome shoppers with a wink – as well as its giant dance-on piano that had a starring role in the 1988 Tom Hanks movie classic “Big.”
There also will be a 27-foot tall rocket ship steered by teddy-bear astronauts, an adoption center where pint-sized shoppers answer questions (”Will you take good care of your doll?” ) before getting an adoption “certificate” and taking home their new doll. And at the FAO Raceway, employees dressed as mechanics will put together RC cars designed by young customers.
“It’s about the theater, it’s not just a toy store,” says David Niggli, FAO Schwarz’s chief merchandising officer, who noted that much of the retail industry is now similarly offering unique experiences to attract shoppers in the era of Amazon. “Timing seems right for us to be back because everybody’s doing that.”
FAO is returning to the toy scene in the first holiday season in decades without Toys R Us, which closed its doors in June.
FAO Schwarz shuttered its Fifth Avenue flagship in July 2015, then was purchased the following year by ThreeSixty Brands.