Not Blockbuster’s Night
The New York Daily News, MSNBC, and Wall Street Journal (subscription required to view full article) all recently reported that Blockbuster’s recent regulatory filing with the SEC raises “serious doubt” about the company’s ability to survive. The Daily News article reports that the survival of Blockbuster hinges partially on their ability to secure a $250 million loan, while MSNBC notes that “even if the loan is funded, the company said it ‘may not have sufficient liquidity to finance the ongoing obligations of our business, which raises substantial doubt about our ability to continue as a going concern’.”
While Blockbuster remains the largest movie rental chain in America, the success of Netflix (DVD rental through mail) and Redbox (DVD rental through kiosk) has apparently cut into Blockbuster’s profits in recent years. Discussing the former pervasiveness of the chain, an article on Salon by Mike Madden notes that “there wasn’t a suburban strip mall or a gentrified city neighborhood in America that didn’t wind up with a Blockbuster outlet.” But this pervasiveness did not lead all consumers to embrace Blockbuster; in 2005, Blockbuster settled a lawsuit related to their late fee policy. Salon writer Mike Madden harbors no nostalgia for the chain:
“Walking into a Blockbuster, even in its glory days, meant you hadn’t managed to come up with anything more exciting to do that night than rent some mainstream Hollywood crap you somehow missed in the theaters. “Make it a Blockbuster night” may have been its marketing slogan, but somehow the vibe in the place made it feel like nothing more than a clever way to say “Admit defeat, loser.” Every one of the stores was, and still is, exactly the same: all electric blue and canary yellow, with dizzyingly bright walls, trailers for months-old action flicks playing loudly on overhead TV screens and a few surly employees behind the counter. In a pathetic attempt to be an all-in-one supplier of an entire night’s entertainment, the stores throw some popcorn, candy and soda for sale near the checkout line.”
Some of Zogby’s data suggests that the current recession is leading to an increase in low-cost forms of entertainment (such as DVD rentals) at the expense of higher-cost forms of entertainment. In a February 2009 interactive poll , 58% of those surveyed agreed that they planned on staying home more instead of going out for entertainment because of the current economic conditions. But to judge from their recent financial problems, Blockbuster is not benefiting from people’s preferences for lower-cost entertainment. Why might this be? And have your entertainment plans (dvd rental or otherwise) changed recently?
consumption, culture, economics, lifestyles, media, recreation
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I agree, I never much liked Blockbuster as a store. The movies were OK, but the design and colors were hideous. I think they simply did not reach into the digital streaming game quick enough.
I’ve only had my VUDU Box a few months, but I am glad I bought it. I think eventually everything will be digital, and the technology will get better and better.
Blockbuster, to be frank, is being left behind. They were probably OK until the advent of on-demand movies on cable, people can rent a movie without leaving the house, and the movie is actually available to rent. That, plus Netflix and streaming internet media make everything so much more convenient than Blockbuster. And that’s the actual bottom line — convenience to the customer.
Madden’s assessment of Blockbuster being a place for “losers” to get their “mainstream Hollwood crap” reeks of the faux chic that he and the other poseurs at “Salon” habitually spew. He whines that indies of the type that the pretentious pseudo-snobs at “Salon” look for aren’t on BB’s shelves. Well, duh. Clearly he’s forgotten that there are families, and singles for that matter, who sometimes simply enjoy staying in and watching a movie that is simply entertaining.
BB’s downslide has little to do with their choice of colors, I suspect, and more to do with their business model. At least he got that obvious point into his inane article.
Lets not Forget the DVDPlay terminals. Whenever I have to repair these I have to wait for a crowd of people. And this was before the economy problems. I just think people might be wising up and spending wisely as well as not wanting to go to the theatre and pay to watch some Hollyweird movie depicting things they don’t care to put up with.
I stopped going to Blockbuster when it got “too big for it’s britches.” As the company grew, it’s customer service went down-hill. As they opened more and more locations, and the small, independent video stores went out of business, it seemed to me that the staff at Blockbusters became insufferable. I refused to give my hard earned money to a company that treated its customers as if we were a herd of cattle. I wish that we would learn to support our local, small, excellent-customer-service-companies; even when they are not as conveniently located or as cheap as the giant mega-box stores. We do it to ourselves; we help the mega monster no-customer-service-comanies become the only game in town. Then we wonder why we have to put up with such garbage. Well, the next step is to shop online and then the mega monsters will go out of business. But, we will be repeating the same stupid cycle, because once there are no competitors for the online providers, we will once again be treated like the cattle that we are.
My Blockbuster story. I rented from them for a long time, a ton of movies. My last rental about 6-8 months ago was a movie I just forgot to return. When I got a notice I procrastinated a bit in taking it back after all there was suppose to be no late fees, but you can say it was my fault. When I did get back with it I was told that I could nor return the movie, that I had to pay the full price for it. Needless to say as a long time customer who had renter many movies I was somewhat miffed especially when I asked them to cut me a little slack. They refused. That is when I put it this way to the sales associate. I told them they had a choice either work with me on an amicable arrangement or lose a long time very good customer. They told me it was out of their hands and there was nothing they could do. They handed me the movie back and I walked out never to return again. Do to their attitude, they lost a good customer and needless to say a lot of movie rentals.
For a business that depends on customer loyalty, they are very short sighted. No wonder their sales have dropped.
We have satellite t.v. and can order from our home and not have to return anything. Returning the DVD was always a pain for me.
Well duh! BB has always had the “surliest” customer service of any store of any kind I have ever been in.
I used to rent from them in the early days…a lot. I had kids and it was fun to make popcorn and sit and watch movie after movie on the weekends when nothing else was going on.
But after a few rather HIGH late fees for a movie or two. (I mean really folks, a late fee that was more than the movie itself cost? and they had multiple copies that were not even rented out as they were all old B horror movies we rented) I decided I would rather not deal with them anymore.
Its no wonder with the advance of technology that a surly business practice is put where it belongs!
I rent exclusively from Redbox. They are only $1 a night. You can go online and preorder movies. You can return movies to any location you want. On demand movies are to expensive. Video stores are to expensive. I don’t rent a lot of movies so Netflix would be a waste of money. Redbox is also the most convenient because they have them at most major stores so it’s easy to grab a movie while shopping for other stuff.