Why is Blockbuster going bankrupt?

[bicker]

Again, correct me if I am wrong, On-Demand does not provide 1080p yet, or it's extremely limited.

As far as I know, there aren't any broadcast sources that provide 1080p through air or wire.

This is important, as our home theater is a 1080p projector on a 120" screen.

The super-premium customer can afford to order all the BDs retail, for delivery on date of release, rather than renting.

 

[johnsontrio]

We are not Nexflix or pay per view users but we do have the mac daddy cable with DVR. We stopped using Blockbuster many years ago. We rented from them infrequently and got sick and tired of having to register again each time we went in to rent a video. Their system kicked you out after a ~3 month or so and you had to provide all your info and credit card info again. It was too much hassle for us to deal with and we stopped going. We now just wait for movies to show up On Demand or we see them in the theaters.

 

[bicker]

Coverage is factor, I think - for a long time there was a video store practically on every corner in suburbia, but none out here in Small Town USA. There were, at the peak of brick & mortar rental places, 6 different locations within 2 miles of my mother's house, but only one small independant place with a so-so selection in the town we live in. Blockbuster just kept building in suburbia and ignoring the opportunities out here. They'd have done better, particularly when Netflix came on the scene, to look at places where technology is slower to catch on and there is less competition.

I can't agree with that. Such areas are as likely as not to have been subject to comparably inadequate revenue-generation. The same folks who were slow to adopt Netflix were slow to rent DVDs. While you pay the bills on the general customer, you make profit on the premium customer and so you place your retail store where you can capitalize on such customers. You don't place your retail store where such customers are less like to be.

And good thing Blockbuster didn't do that. They'd have failed faster and harder if they had yet-even-more costly b&m expense in their business model.

Indeed, the most likely scenario where Blockbuster could have avoided bankruptcy involves them selling off b&m locations very quickly after Netflix came on the scene.

 

[bicker]

Blockbuster was the last man standing in traditional video rentals, so as awful as they are, they did things better, but customer preferences have changed.

You've hit the nail on the head. People love to complain, but in the end, Blockbuster was among the best in the market sector - it is the market sector, itself, that failed.

 

[Shyvioletisme]

we quit renting from Blockbuster years ago(between the high cost of rentals, the small to nonexistant selection of indie flicks and the dubbed --instead of subtitled -- sad selection of foreign films...when we wanted to rent we went to Hastings in town(cheaper rentals, huge selection). However now we just go with Netflix. My thoughts are: 1) it's inexpensive compared to normal renting; 2) the selection is amazing 3) yes there are some movies that aren't available to rent as soon as they come out, but if I really wanted to see it that badly I would have gone to the theater to see it. So clearly it's not a pressing matter.

In my mind, Blockbuster has been the bad choice for years...came in and took over the small local videos stores, charged more and had worse customer service. Not the people I want to give money to at all.

 

[Planogirl]

I still insist on getting movies from a video store but I won't go to Blockbuster. Poor service, high prices and them being out of movies finally drove me away. I go to Family Video who I hope is doing OK.

 

[brerrabbit]

Definately not "the" reason they are going out of business but certainly an ironic twist to their whole story is that Blockbuster actually pursued the first venture into streaming video similar to what Netflix is doing today. Only problem was they pursued it with the Broadband division of Enron. That deal died on the vine and I guess Blockbuster felt they were so burned they did not continue to pursue it the way netflix and others did so now as a brick and mortar business they are the brink of bankruptcy.