Disney Store Dead at 34

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, one day we will all return to the mysterious realm from which our consciousness was born. Once our time on this mortal coil has ended, all that’s left will be the memories held by those who loved us. Those people too will disappear, and we can only hope that they will have spoken our name enough that it never fully vanishes from the minds of the living. That, or we remain as stores-within-stores at specific Target locations.

In March, Disney announced that it would be closing its standalone Disney Store locations, deciding to focus on e-commerce instead. This week, nearly all of the remaining Disney Stores, long a safe haven for bored children forced to accompany their mothers to the mall, will close up shop.

The Disney Store, only 34 years old at the time of its passing, will be remembered as a loving presence in the lives of millions of young children who did not yet understand what “merchandise tie-ins” were. A magical place where you could get Auntie Anne’s cinnamon sugar dust all over a real-life Woody doll that your dad wouldn’t buy you, the Disney Store was where the movies became real.

Legends never die, and that is true for the Disney Store. Its memory will be preserved in Targets around the country, with more than 160 locations of “The Disney Store at Target” set to open before the holiday season. Adults who knew the Disney Store in its prime will be able to take their own children to these memorial sites and say, “This used to be a full store in the mall,” while their kids ignore them to make Elsa and Olaf kiss.

The Disney Store is survived by The Walt Disney Company, Disneyland, Walt Disney World, and the youngest member of the family, Disney+. In lieu of flowers, the family has requested that you stream the television show Hawkeye when it premieres later this year.