Looks like ToysRUs has been freed for the time being from its relationship with Amazon.com. I suspect that other retailers will simiilar arrangements will start to follow suit either at Amazon or other similar type of "store front" arrangements.

When I say this deal six years ago, and similar ones within the next couple of years, I knew this was doomed move. Not just do to "legal mumbo jumbo" like exclusivity, but there mere fact that it was clear that online sales were a strategic part of any retailers business. Why on earth you would want to essentially outsource a strategic business asset. It was like you decided to turn over operation of your brick-and-mortar stores to the firm you hired for janitorial service. Sure, they knew a lot about the building, but very little about your customers, your goals, and how to move your business forward.

Back then of course, online retailing was looked at more as an extension to your business instead of your actual business. I always found this odd since in the same breath those same people turning over that "extension" to someone else would talk about how revolutionary, threatening, disruptive, whatever the Internet was to their traditional business. Instead of embracing it, they pawned it off to somone else.

Deals like the Amazon one never made sense for the "brand name supplier" IMHO. You became just another brand at the big Amazon mall, just like Proctor and Gamble is another brand at a Target store. And Amazon was clearly movitated by increasing the number transactions and visitors at their site, not necessarily yours, and that would naturally lead them to other partnerships and more brands. It does amaze me though that there was not stronger language defining who could do what to whom in the actual deal.

Oh well, I will sit back and see what happens to Amazon over the long run as more and more companies look to bring their strategic assets back in house.