Toys “R” Us Canada is facing at least seven lawsuits from landlords who say the struggling toy retailer collectively owes them $31.3 million in unpaid rent and other damages, according to Ontario court documents filed last year over stores it occupied in 2024 and 2025. The claims have not been tested in court.
Seven landlords, $31.3 million
Documents filed with an Ontario court claim the chain failed to pay rent for several properties in 2024 and 2025. The landlords include RioTrin Properties — part of the RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust empire — and Calloway Real Estate Investment Trust, and the spaces include locations in Saint John, N.B., Belleville, Ont., and Oakville, Ont.
Toys “R” Us Canada has since moved out of many of the locations at the heart of the lawsuits and shuttered dozens of other stores over the last few years, shrinking its footprint from 81 stores in 2021 to just 40 by some counts.
A Toys “R” Us Canada spokesperson said they had no information to share for this story, while lawyers representing the company and its CEO did not respond to requests for comment.
How the claims pile up
Court documents filed in most of the suits allege a pattern: once the chain missed a month’s rent, landlords warned that failure to pay within days could end the lease. When payment allegedly still didn’t come, the leases were terminated and the landlords sued.
Many lease terms magnify the bill: in several cases, missing one month obliged the retailer to pay the next three months upfront with the late payment, plus fees or costs such as removing signage.
Toys “R” Us Canada has yet to file a statement of defence in many of the cases. In others, it has asked the court to dismiss the matter, saying landlords knew it was about to close some stores because liquidation signage had been posted at the properties.
The pattern is still spreading. Media reports this month suggested Primaris and QuadReal Property Group are ending leases at Stone Road Mall in Ontario and Willowbrook Shopping Centre in B.C. over unpaid rent. Primaris president Patrick Sullivan confirmed all six Toys “R” Us locations in his company’s portfolio are now closed.
A turnaround that keeps shrinking
The chain is run by Putman Investments, the Ancaster, Ont.-based firm that bought Toys “R” Us and Babies “R” Us Canada from affiliates of Fairfax Financial Holdings in 2021, after Fairfax had acquired them for $300 million in 2018 as the U.S. arm filed for bankruptcy protection.
“We love buying businesses that we feel are undervalued. We love a good turnaround,” CEO Doug Putman said when the chain came under his control, describing a list of 100 “really great” ideas, including spaces to host birthdays and tea parties. Putman carved out sections of stores for HMV departments — another of his retail brands — obtained $120 million in financing from Gordon Brothers, and remodelled some stores last year to add Playlab, an indoor play and party space.
Retail experts say the experiments may not be enough against online shopping, Amazon and Walmart, and consumers cutting back. “The toy retail business is not collapsing, but the dynamics are more challenging,” said Jenna Jacobson, director of the Retail Leadership Institute at Toronto Metropolitan University. “The big question is whether in a year’s time Toys “R” Us is going to exist and whether it’s in a physical format or is it going to exist in an online format.”
Fractures have also formed elsewhere in the Putman business. Home goods chain Rooms + Spaces, opened in 2023 in former Bed Bath & Beyond properties, has disappeared, as has tea shop T. Kettle. Everest Toys, a distributor where Doug Putman is vice-president, was forced into receivership by TD Bank, which says it is owed about $25 million. In October, Toys “R” Us Canada emailed customers about a data breach that may have compromised personal information, and it has since paused online sales altogether, promising they will return in mid-February.
The suits kept coming
The January reporting was not the end of it. In February, RioCan filed another lawsuit after terminating the retailer’s lease at Toronto’s Lawrence Allen Centre, seeking about $4 million, including a missed January rent payment of roughly $43,000 on a 15,580-square-foot space leased until 2035. RioCan also dropped a separate claim over Calgary’s Brentwood Village Mall, while RioTrin continues to pursue the Orléans case; Toys “R” Us has asked for that case to be dismissed, saying it gave notice and offered a replacement tenant.
Suppliers have joined the queue: court records show six toy suppliers, including Spin Master — the company behind Paw Patrol — sued the retailer last year for more than $4 million in allegedly unpaid merchandise invoices, claims that also remain untested in court.
