Netflix just raised their prices again... there goes my budget!

[maggiew]

I bet with the popularity of streaming, they are trying to phase out DVDs. Lots of people will drop the DVD portion and in a year or so they will say it's not as popular and drop them altogether. Just my guess.

Wasn't there a discussion in the past year where Netflix stated they wanted to go to all streaming?? I recall a thread here on the DIS about it. I think it was the last time when the price of one DVD went from $8.99 to $9.99.


Maggie

 

[marie1203]

We are canceling ours, because it is cheaper for us to do blockbuster express and redbox.

 

[JB2K]

Now I have been eyeing Hulu+ so I catch up on current TV seasons without waiting for DVD release on Netlix, but still need to do more research.

The only caveat on Hulu Plus is that if you have favorite shows that air on CBS, you won't find them, here (as Hulu is currently jointly-owned by Disney, NBC Universal, and FOX).

Speaking of Hulu, changes may be on the horizon as Disney has definitely expressed an interest in selling its' stake.

 

[ericamcl]

We are canceling ours, because it is cheaper for us to do blockbuster express and redbox.

I canceled ours this morning.
We just don't use it enough to justify the cost now.
Plus, we use it for Blu-Ray which added an additional $2.00 per month to our cost.

 

[WheelCEO]

If my life ever got to the point where $72/yr busted my budget, I'd have to do some serious looking at my life decisions.

 

[jmsaj]

Every little bit helps so I canceled this morning

 

[Dax]

We are keeping our...I have been with Netflix since it started, and I have weathered all the prices changes..

My DH loves the streaming, and I enjoy the DVD option. We will drop the amount of DVD's from 3 to 2, but we had planned to do that anyways...but I will not do any of this until last week of Aug...nothing is changing until 9/1 anyways...

 

[daraddg]

well bad move right now on their part because I was paying $10 a month and mainly use the streaming ,so if I have to change I am dropping to just streaming which will save me $2.00 and they lose...(til they raise the prices back up to what they were for 1/2 the service you had)

 

[lakelandgal70]

We love our Netflix and have had it many years. I just switched over to streaming only for couple reasons. We don't have time to watch DVDs. I swear when the weekend gets here we are not home long enough to watch one. So I feel it is waste of money. Last DVD sat on our entertainment stand for 2months. That is crazy. So why pay extra money for something we aren't using anyway. Plus we just added HBO so we watch a lot of movies off there and our cable ON Demand thingy.

 

[mrssmith06]

I've got a DVD due to be here today and after I return that one, I think I will cancel the DVD option and maybe just keep the streaming. I'm still debating on that part though. We don't watch the streaming much but it is nice to have sometimes... We usually only get 2, maybe 3 DVDs in a month and that's not worth $7.99 alone to me, especially when I can get the same selection in Redbox for $1 each...

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

We are modifying our account. We were being very inconsistent in watching the DVD's we did receive. DH wants to switch to streaming. I figure if we miss the DVD option, we can always add it back. My husband likes the tech aspect of being able to stream. I could take it or leave it.

So instead of our bill going up by $5...we will reduce it buy a few bucks.

 

[RitaE]

I read the account page this morning and it says the new pricing will start the first billing after 9/1 - which for us is 9/25.

So we have awhile to decide. I think we might as well keep what we have for the rest of the summer.

 

[timmac]

I get where you're coming from. I read the article, but I can also see that they are expanding to 43 more countries. Take the subscription prices right now, without jacking them up and multiply that by 43 - they will have more than enough to pay their billion dollar bill to the studios without jacking up our costs.

I feel like they cut out all the competitors so they could charge whatever they want because there are little to few other options for us movie lovers

Keep in mind that adding more countries also means licensing costs for those additional regions as well. (Familiar with DVD region coding? There's a reason that's in place) Also, the US is, and will probably be for some time, the largest market, by a big margin... so as a PP already said, it's not 43 times more revenue by any means.

 

[Echo queen]

I got the email of the price increase and cancelled today The last 3 movies we streamed where not without problems. Oh well.

 

[kimmyann]

If my life ever got to the point where $72/yr busted my budget, I'd have to do some serious looking at my life decisions.

It's not a budget buster for most since Netflix is technically a luxury, not a necessity. When you factor in everything else going up, including necessities such as food then you start having to analyze what is really used & at the top of the list. Movies to me are not, I'd rather spend the money doing something real.

I personally think your comment was offensive, just my opinion. Glad you don't ever have to think about money, hope it stays that way for you. Good luck. BTW, this is a budget board. Correct?

 

[jcemom]

well bad move right now on their part because I was paying $10 a month and mainly use the streaming ,so if I have to change I am dropping to just streaming which will save me $2.00 and they lose...(til they raise the prices back up to what they were for 1/2 the service you had)

This is exactly what I did! DH talked to two guys at work who say they did the exact same thing.

 

[hipchickie]

I think we will get rid of DVD for now - just no time in the summer to watch them anyway. We have been putting off making a decision about completely dropping cable, so maybe this will force the choice.
I am a little surprised everyone is jumping all over netflix, and not pointing the finger where the blame really goes - the movie industry

 

[Muushka]

I think we will get rid of DVD for now - just no time in the summer to watch them anyway. We have been putting off making a decision about completely dropping cable, so maybe this will force the choice.
I am a little surprised everyone is jumping all over netflix, and not pointing the finger where the blame really goes - the movie industry

I was ready to jump ship when my husband said the same thing you did about it being more to do with the movie industry rather than a greedy Netflix. So we will remain Netflix subscribers.

 

[Disneefun]

This AM I got a survey about the price increases (got it through one of the rewards sites I do). It was super short, but basically asked if I was upset by the increase, would I cancel streaming, discs, neither, or the account altogether, and what would I use as a replacement service.

I don't know if it was sponsored by netflix or a competitor and there wasn't any place to enter free form comments, but I told them I would be cancelling, using a replacement service, and I was disappointed in the increase. Probably won't do much, but it was kind of funny that someone (netflix or other) thinks the outrage is worth putting a survey together over to gauge opinions.

 

[solfan68]

So much to say on this topic.

No its not a budget buster for us, but I am pretty annoyed at Netflix wanting to jack so many of us from $10 to $16. They want to save on the postage, and are counting on a good many customers - I think - dropping the discs and keeping the streaming. Customer cuts their bill from ten to eight. Netflix has less DVDs to move on any given week. Netflix tries to spin it as a win/win for everyone. I saw where they were trying to position the $10 membership as streaming, plus discs. I never saw it that way. To me, it was always discs, plus streaming.

On one hand, I'm tempted to jump on that bandwagon. After all our family just got a Roku and I hate to think that this new toy would be less valuable if I should decide to drop streaming. On the other hand, while streaming is nice and we do use it, so much of the new content simply is not available in the current streaming catalog. If I recall correctly, Netflix does have about 20,000 titles on streaming(versus Prime's 5,000). That's not bad, but when I think about why I originally joined Netflix, it was to see movies that I opted to skip at the local megaplex. Those movies ARE NOT on streaming - at least for the moment.

I'm also inclined to drop streaming and keep discs just because its the opposite of what Netflix is trying to steer us all toward. But that's a whole other thing.

For the time I have left, I will reorder my queue. Try to prioritize the movies that I really want to see before the September rate hike. When that time comes I'll make a decision. I'll likely join the streaming only line, with occasional trips to one of the area's Redbox kiosks, keeping the monthly movie budget at $10, just spread around.

In closing - I saw a really funny tweet the other day: "Dear Netflix, Hulu Plus is starting to look like your younger, hotter sister. With cake." Best of luck to others staring down a Netflix decision.