Forum - View topicNEWS: Blockbuster Near Bankrupt
|
Goto page Previous 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Next Note: this is the discussion thread for this article |
| Author | Message | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
DriftRoot
 Posts: 222 Location: NH |
|
|||
|
While I have nothing against Blockbuster personally I do find myself happy about the company losing so much money. Why? Well, where I live, many small, mom & pop type video stores have either gone under or barely survived over the years thanks to this video chain (and others!). The ones that are still around keep going because of customer loyalty, their eclectic selection of videos and their friendly, neighborhood atmosphere. If a chain store like Blockbuster vanishes, I can see many of these small, independent video stores thriving when the non-Netflix crowd turns to them for good prices and selection. Not everyone feverishly plans weeks in advance what movie they might want to watch.
Also, as video-on-demand flourishes via TV, even online retailers like Netflix are going to have to alter their marketing strategy a bit, or get into the VOD business. I personally can't WAIT for instant, clickable access to all sorts of films. p.s. I agree about the Netflix anime selection - it's backed up and slow to ship. |
||||
|
||||
|
Killer 7
Posts: 68 Location: "America,F&&k Yeah"! |
|
|||
i beg to differ, at least BB does'nt have excrusiating waiting time for any new anime releases which i can't say the same for Nettrix. it took me 3 weeks to receive Gunslinger girl as oppossed to blockbuster's 1 measly day. and in case you didn't know Netflix has been sued for failing to keep their promises (I.E.delivery time) serves them right, the arrogant pric%s. |
||||
|
||||
|
Psohrb
Posts: 5 |
|
|||
|
Here ya go...and because I'm such a nice gentleman I'll even post the link for you to read.
BTW this is one of many reasons why I don't post very much at forums. Regardless whether you believe me or not, there is info out there about Blockbuster and its practices. Hollywood video isn't that much different. They both have fronts and allegiances to groups that profit from special interests. Not anything new here. Heres the link. http://www.answers.com/topic/blockbuster-video Blockbuster Owner... Harry Wayne Huizenga Huizenga grew up in a wealthy family whose economic fortunes went up and down. Starting with a single garbage truck, he grew Waste Management Inc. into the largest waste disposal company in the United States, before repeating the process with Blockbuster Video. He then moved into sports franchises, and owns the Miami Dolphins and Florida Panthers, as well as Dolphins Stadium in Miami. He previously owned the Florida Marlins. Huizenga has been scorned by the public in South Florida since the dismantling of the Florida Marlins team that won the 1997 World Series. He has also come under fire for his perceived allegiance to the Christian right, which some allege contributed to systemic censorship in Blockbuser Video stores during his ownership of the company. His most recent venture is Auto Nation. Wayne Huizenga graduated from the Pine Crest School in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in 1955 and is an alumnus of Calvin College. |
||||
|
||||
sailornyanko
 Posts: 134 Location: Mexico City |
|
|||
|
I think Blockbuster will continue but not as dominantly as before which I think is a good thing because now they will actually try to pleasue their customers.
Living in Mexico, few people here have credit cards and there's almost no online business done here. I don't think it's gonna become more like the US anytime soon. Typical people would rather go to a local video store than renting it online. That said, I've noticed in the past month that my local Blockbuster got like 70% more movies than ever. They now actually HAVE anime on DVD to rent even though it's mostly imported R1's of Evangelion. Quite a huge leap from years of only having 1 copy of the Street Fighter V II movie. It was obviously a very smart move to FINALLY expand their video selection since bootlegging is so damn freaking cheap and easy to get in Mexico. However their strategy will help people from buying boots but still their prices are horribly high. 47 pesos (about 4.25 US dollars) for 1 new release DVD for rent for just 1 day and payback fees of another 40 pesos per each missed day is idiotic. A bootleg costs 80 pesos and the quality is almost the same and I wouldn't have to return it tomorrow or else. Blockbuster mostly crushed a mexican video rental chain called Videocentro which I don't think was bad because their selection sucked. However mom & pop stores won't close here. Been a long time since i last went there, but I know a joint called Dante's videoplace where you can rent bootleg VHS for 15 pesos if it's a new title and only 10 pesos for an old title. You have to return it tomorrow, but since the punishment fee is just 1 peso, well you could have it for over a week and still you'd pay far less than by renting at Blockbuster. This was when bootleg DVD's weren't accesible to pirates, but now that they are, I assume they switched to DVD with obviously far better quality image. Once when i rented 8 Mile on VHS since they were recorded the old way (a guy with a camcorder at the theater), you'd see people getting up and the camera moving. But DVD boots only differ from the real del with just a bit less image quality. I mean, Blockbuster can get the anime and I'll definitely rent it, but faithful poorer people will still go to the pop & pop stores for cheap boots. They want to fight boots? Bring back the prices to 20 pesos the way it was 10 years ago. Final note: Despite the ridiculous prices, they still get filled with people Friday and Saturday nights so they won't dissapear anytime soon. |
||||
|
||||
|
GATSU
Posts: 15324 |
|
|||
So Viacom downgrading Blockbuster's assets and re-purchasing their stocks in the company isn't considered dumping? |
||||
|
||||
Haru to Ashura
 Posts: 617 Location: Termina |
|
|||
|
Not a total shocker for me, because Blockbuster treats its customers like crap. Serves them right.
Myself and lots of people I know have been screwed over by their business. The most reccent mishap in my mind is that an employee verbally told us the wrong return date for a video, then when we returned it, we found out it was two days late. The employee admitted to making a mistake, but they still tried to charge us for it - which brings up another reason that I'm not suprised that Blockbuster is losing money: there are basically no consequences if you never pay the fees. They don't check up on you - I walked back in a year later and signed up with my cell number instead of the home phone, no questioned asked. Another ridiculous business practice is that, even if there are 10+ Blockbusters within a 30 mile radius, they're not networked together at all. It's a ridiculous business practice. If you could rent from one Blockbuster, let's say, near your job, and return to a more convenient location near your house, they would get a lot more business. Netflix is a major competitor, but as stated above, I don't think they're the sole reason that Blockbuster is having troubles. And these days, their rental prices are ridiculous, you might as well spend a few dollars more and buy the movie. In my case, I stopped renting video games because I could pay 6 dollars to rent a game, or just buy the game for 15 dollars used. I'm busy, I won't have enough time to play the game constantly during the duration of a single week, so buying it is a much better deal.
Same here, which is a shame. I always used to enjoy going to smaller rental stores, there prices were better, they were friendlier and had a better selection of older titles, not just new ones. Sometimes I'd like to rent titles for older video game consoles and what not. Last edited by Haru to Ashura on Fri Nov 11, 2005 6:14 pm; edited 2 times in total |
||||
|
||||
|
appleturbo
Posts: 51 |
|
|||
|
while I feel sorry for anyone who may lose their job because of this. Personally I think it's great.
1. They cheated so many people out of late fees and then they went and got sued by their end of late fees-opps there is a late fee after all promo. 2. They pushed a lot of mom/pop video stores out of business. I don't think Netflix is the sole reason for this. I think they are contributing heavly but you also have to look at in demand on cable/satellite pay per view services taking a chunk of money and the economy. Gas prices are so high that people have to pull money from other areas to pay to drive to work. So guess what the number one thing is going to be entertainment. meaning less movies. |
||||
|
||||
v1cious
 Posts: 6203 Location: Houston, TX |
|
|||
that explains why they don't have a porn section |
||||
|
||||
|
Karala
Posts: 43 |
|
|||
|
Maybe that's why the local Blockbusters has just recently cut their store size in half?
 I'm sure that whole "no late fees" thing doesn't help them get their movies back.
|
||||
|
||||
|
bquinn
Posts: 19 |
|
|||
|
Does not bother me. I have not rented anything since VHS died out and DVD took over. I know what i like and i buy what i like.
Anyhow i can think of many things hurting blockbuster, from online rentals, online piracy, to the fact that many people like collecting DVDs. I saw this coming a long time ago, i knew when they started that "no late fees" campaign that they were starting to hurt and had to try something desperate. Well lets look on the bright side, if they do go under there will be a lot of big time going out of business sales and cheap dvds. |
||||
|
||||
kusanagi-sama
 Posts: 1723 Location: Wichita Falls, TX |
|
|||
|
Well, from what I remember seeing recently, Blockbuster hasn't made an actual full year profit since around 1998.
Here Blockbuster's net income (all losses) reports since 2000: 2000 -$75.9 million 2001 -$240.3 million 2002 -$1,627.6 million (-$1.63 billion) 2003 -$983.9 million 2004 -$1,248.8 million (-$1.25 billion) last 6 Quarters 6/2004 $46.8 million 9/2004 -$1,416.4 million (-$1.42 billion) <-- this is from the cumilative effect of a change in accounting 12/2004 $8.2 million 3/2005 -$57.5 million 6/2005 -$57.2 million 9/2005 -$491 million Here's is the long term debt statement for the last 5 years: 2000 $1,136.5 million 2001 $546.4 million 2002 $408.7 million 2003 $75.1 million 2004 $1,119.7 million last 5 quarters 6/2004 $73.0 9/2004 $1,071.7 12/2004 $1,119.7 3/2005 $1,087.8 6/2005 $1,202.4 |
||||
|
||||
z7q2
 Posts: 29 Location: Jersey Shore, U.S.A. |
|
|||
|
I have been quite happy with Blockbuster's online rental service, I have been using it for almost a year now. Of course there have been a few glitches such as:
1. DVDs arriving broken 2. DVDs not arriving at all 3. The wrong DVD being delivered but they have been quick to replace/resend when this happens, and I have never been hassled about it. Also, I can keep a DVD for weeks on end if I want to, there is no real return date. And returning a DVD is as easy as a trip to the mailbox. The free store rental coupons are great because you don't have to give up impulse renting, as in, I need to see this movie NOW!!1! But I do have to say, since they stopped the late fees the in-store selection is pretty dismal. With the online store I can get a hold of really obscure movies and such if I want to. Which brings me to Blockbuster Online's Anime selection. It is fantastic! And Huge! Much more extensive than what you can get in the store. But I'll never really know how much bigger, because of their browsing software. When you browse by genre, such as 'Anime', the software will only produce 300 results. It used to produce only 500 results, so they are getting worse now, not better. They probably limit the search results because of server performance issues or something similiar. I've seen alot of anime over the years, so I would like to be able to browse their entire Anime collection to pick out new titles that I might not know about, but I can't. What I have done on many occasions is browse the Anime Encyclopedia here on ANN and when I find something interesting, I'll see if Blockbuster has it. With very little exception (read: ecchi) they will. So frankly I would not mind if Blockbuster had to close all their brick and mortar stores, as long as they kept the online rentals active. As a side note, a friend of mine in another state uses NetFlix, and we kept careful records in excel spreadsheets of shipping and return time for NetFlix and Blockbuster. After about six months we concluded they were about the same - 3 days to ship, 3 days to process a return. We averaged 12-14 DVDs a month. At $18 a month that's less than $1.50 a rental. What is it in the store, almost $5 a rental? Tack on the cost of gas to drive there and back, and online rental is even more of a bargain. |
||||
|
||||
|
Starwind Amada
Posts: 981 Location: Easton, PA, USA |
|
|||
|
I used to rent from Blockbuster, but stopped a long time ago due to their crappy selection of anime. I own pretty much everything they have, and most of it has been out for years. Oh, and my local store STILL has Lupin the 3rd: The Secret of Mamo on the New Release shelf despite my attempts to tell them that it came out 3 years ago.
And someone mentioned bad service. That reminds me of the one time when I... here, just read it: Me: "Yeah, I wanted to rent Ghost in the Shell, but there are no more copies on the shelf. Do you have some that were recently returned, or are they all rented out?" Cashier (some high-school dropout): "Hang on, I'll check." 10 minutes later... Cashier: "No, we had a bunch left. How could you miss it?" Me: "That can't be right. Let me see." I look at the DVD and it's some movie called Ghosts from Hell. Me: "Uh, this isn't the movie I wanted. I asked for a Japanese animated film called Ghost in the Shell." Cashier: "Oh, that should be next to the Pokemon stuff. But aren't you a little old for those cartoons?" Voice: "Shouldn't you be looking for a job?" The cashier turns around to face his boss. Cashier: "Oh shit! Uh, I will go find your movie." Boss: "Get out. You're fired. Sir, I'll gladly get you your movie." 5 minutes later... Boss: "Here you are. Sorry it took so long." I look at the DVD and it's GitS. Me: "Thank you very much." Boss: "I'm sorry for my employee's rudeness. He's always been a bit of a problem, but insulting customers is a big mistake. To apologize, you can keep that movie. Go and grab a copy of the original packaging for yourself." And that's how I got my free copy of GitS. It was still bad service on the cashier's part, though. Heh, at least I wasn't trying to rent hentai. |
||||
|
||||
remember love
 Posts: 764 Location: Germany |
|
|||
Interesting story...The cashier must of done alot of bad things in the past before you...because I faced simliar situations at best buys and sun coast and they were never fired (This I know because when I go back there still there), and I never gotten a free copy of anything...Lucky devil you. But you're right that was crappy service you asked for one thing and he didn't even get the right item then telling you you're too old for anime...I wonder if the store manager was an anime fan because I still find it a little hard to believe he fired him for...oh well. Because of that "litte old" statement I'm glad he got fired. |
||||
|
||||
omnistry
 Posts: 1015 |
|
|||
I actually switched to Blockbuster Online for that very reason (that, and to get Shrek 2 for free  ).
The one thing I don't like is that they has some volumes out of anime; and then they don't have the others. They don't have Champloo Vol. 2 yet; but they have 3 and so on! |
||||
|
||||
 |
All times are GMT - 5 Hours |
|
|
|
Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group