It wasn’t long ago that we’d talked about all the BuyBuy Baby liquidation sales — but just as quickly as we said goodbye, the baby products retailer has started their comeback.
Yep, things have changed. While all 122 BuyBuy Baby stores in 37 states closed earlier this year, the brand’s new owner — online baby retailer Dream On Me — has some big plans to revive the brand, and has already reopened 11 stores.
Dream On Me makes baby furniture, cribs, mattresses, and other gear, and although they used to be a supplier to BuyBuy Baby, now they have the keys to the brand. Here’s what they’re planning.
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Dream On Me has reopened 11 BuyBuy Baby stores as of Nov. 18, 2023.
Dream On Me has opened 11 stores again in the Northeast on Saturday, Nov. 18, 2023. The company also reopened the online store the same day.
While we haven’t seen any online commentary about the new BuyBuy Baby shopping experience since the stores opened, the company’s execs have shared some hints about what to expect. First up, they’re adding QR codes. When you’re in the store, you can use your phone to scan these codes on items. This will tell you more about baby and maternity products while you’re making your selections.
Another big change is that they have handheld point-of-sale devices. These are special tools that the staff will use to help you check out quickly. This means you won’t have to wait in long lines at the cash register. The stores have also revamped the registry experiences, so you can scan items you like with your phone and add them to your list.
According to online reports, here’s where the 11 BuyBuy Baby new stores are located (most of them were BuyBuy Baby stores that had been closed):
- Connecticut: 1433 New Britain Avenue, West Hartford, CT 06110
- Delaware: 501 West Main St., Newark, DE 19702
- Massachusetts: 160 Granite St., Braintree, MA 02184
- Maryland: 1683 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD 20852
- New Jersey: 711 Route 28, Bridgewater, NJ 08807
- New Jersey: 1590 Kings Highway North, Cherry Hill, NJ 08034
- New Jersey: 675 US Highway 1S, Suite1, Iselin, NJ 08830
- New Jersey: 34 East Ridgewood Ave, Paramus, NJ 07652
- New York: 1261 Niagara Falls Blvd Ste1, Amherst, NY 14226
- New York: 1019 Central Park Ave, Scarsdale, NY 10583
- Virginia: 6398 Springfield Plaza, Springfield, VA 22150
They’re planning to open 100 – 120 stores over the next several years.
Dream On Me is not stopping at just 11 stores. They’ve got bigger plans, aiming to open 100 to 120 stores in the next 1-3 years. Remember, the retailer had 122 stores when they closed this summer. So if Dream On Me’s plans pan out, BuyBuy Baby will be pretty much right back where it was before the closures.
Bed Bath & Beyond has a new owner, too.
Bed Bath & Beyond, which was Buy Buy Baby’s sister retailer, also sold their intellectual property. Overstock.com was the winning bidder, and they’ve already started using the brand name, changing their Canadian website’s name from Overstock.ca to BedBathandBeyond.ca. They’ve got similar plans for renaming Overstock.com to Bed Bath & Beyond in the U.S.
Babies”R”Us is opening in former BuyBuy Baby storefronts in Canada.
Babies”R”Us — which used to be a sister chain of Toys”R”Us — went bankrupt back in 2018, and although several companies wanted to buy them during the bankruptcy proceedings, ultimately all stores shut down and the business was liquidated. But they never fully went away.
The brand’s current owner is WHP Global, a licensing and brand management firm, and in January 2023 they announced plans to open a flagship Babies”R”Us store at the American Dream mall in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The company also plans to open additional Babies R Us stores in the future, and the Babies”R”Us website promises a new experience “coming soon”.
Across the border, Babies”R”Us (and Toys”R”Us, for that matter) have been busy filling storefronts that were occupied by Bed Bath & Beyond and BuyBuy Baby. In the summer of 2023, Canada will see nine new Toys”R”Us stores, and two new Babies”R”Us stores.