Blockbuster Files For Bankruptcy

Dallas-based Blockbuster Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection yesterday, calling into question the futures of over 5,600 stores worldwide. The company will be evaluating each location on a case-by-case basis, and seeks to cut costs after reporting a $558 million net loss last year. Newsweek credits the company's slow adoption of new media distribution methods as a big reason for the company's decline. "... while Blockbuster discussed creating its own subscription service to rival Netflix, it wasn't until August 2004 that its online DVD rental program actually started in the US. And when, in 2004, Coinstar entered the market with its Redbox DVD kiosks, Blockbuster didn't begin installing similar devices until 2008." CNET suggests that "Leaders of pay TV services might be wise to start doing the business equivalent of digging foxholes and manning the battlements or the same thing could happen to them."

Comments

I'll miss them

[beschra]

Browsing in a browser just doesn't hold up to browsing the physical media. Guess I'm just a library kinda guy.

Re:I'll miss them

[tooyoung]

I love my Netflix account, but I do find it difficult to make sure that I don't miss movies when they make it out to video. I tend to try to keep an eye out on the New Releases section of Netflix, but even that doesn't seem to work. The other day my friend mentioned he had rented McGruber, and I swear I never saw that listed as a new release for Netflix.

Netflix's new release section has a problem that I've observed on all other sites that list new releases: the big movies get thrown in the same jumbled mess of a page as all of the latest direct-to-DVD crap, yoga videos, and children's cartoon collections. Sure, I like stumbling upon new movies I haven't heard of, but a lot of the time I just want to see what big releases are making it to DVD. I've yet to find a decent site that ranks new releases by popularity. Any recommendations?

As much as I will always hate Blockbuster for charging me $250 late fees on single movies back in the day, there was something nice about walking the store and browsing the new releases. You could use the number of copies of a movie to point out the popular releases, and even if you had missed that a movie had come out several months ago, it would probably still be on the wall.

The Onion

[oldspewey]

Obligatory Onion reference

Time for them to throw in the towel

[MikeRT]

At this point, Blockbuster is so far behind its competitors that the only responsible choice is to liquidate its inventory, cut some severance checks and pass on the remaining cash as a distribution to shareholders.

We're not used to thinking like that, but Blockbuster has probably not a hope in Hell of actually holding its own at this point. Therefore it should do whatever it can to pass along its remaining value directly back to its shareholders before it squanders it on a vain attempt to beat very entrenched competitors who already have mindshare high ground with the public.

Re:Time for them to throw in the towel

[Maxo-Texas]

There also has to be a reason Netflix can get buy on $8.95 or $15.95 a month.

Lower salaries? Corporate offices in an inexpensive location? No corporate headquarters?

Older companies build up fixed costs over time. If they get big enough, they get the law changed to protect them. If they don't make that size, the die off.

I finally bit the bullet and signed up for netflix last night.

AMAZING.

Took under 10 minutes and I was watching "Pushing up Daisies" and then browse parts of several movies.

With my new blu ray player (still in the box) I should be able to watch these on my TV too.. .and on my iPhone.. and at my friend's house on their computer.

Amazing. Incentives for pirating drop waaaaay down when you get "all you can eat" for $8.95. Some stuff I'll have to wait to come in the mail.

Seems too good to last-- to good to be true.
At some point the people supplying netflix will raise their rates as they did on the cable tv providers.

But for now- nice.

Re:So sad, but it's time

[mcgrew]

Tell me, fellow slashdotters: was there anything better when you were a kid than going to the video store on a friday night to rent a video game or movie?

There were no videogames or movie rentals when I was a kid, kid. I spent my Friday nights at the drive-in theater (in fact I worked at one when I was a teenager). I spent a lot of time at the public library, and in my room with a slide rule and soldering gun.

I recognize how convenient and better services like Netflix and Gamefly are, but there's just something about going into a dusty old video store and browsing the shelves that convenience will never replace.

Netflix didn't kill Blockbuster, stupidity did. Here in Springfield the Blockbuster store closed down a year or two ago. They were stupid enough to open right across the street from Family Video and rent new releases for four bucks a day while FV rented them for $3 a week. BB rented older movies for $3 for 2 days while FV rented them for a buck a week.

Guess what? Family Video is still there, and a lot of FV stores are in town. AFAIK that was the only Blockbuster here.

Only an idiot opens a store across the street from the competetion and tries to charge higher prices for the same goods. Blockbuster is going bankrupt because their business model is almost as stupid as the record labels.

Re:Meh, dinosaurs died out too

[careysub]

One more greedy corporation who muscled out the small, neighborhood stores and when they finally became the big kid on the block, squeezed their customers for everything they could. Now, in the light of new technology they're unable to control, they become unable to compete. So be it.

In the words of airline stewardesses everywhere: B'bye!

Indeed. My "venal Blockbuster" story are the sheets of prepaid rental coupons that were suitable for "gift giving". My wife bought some sheets of these to give me as a birthday gift - which I used a few times, and then discovered that they had "expired"! These were not some sort of promotional freebies, not even some sort of discount deal, they were full price pre-paid rentals! And in tiny print on the back of the coupons (not evident in any of their gift promotions) I discovered that they were only good for six months. Having advance use of our money for free, and the bonus possibility that I might lose or forget about them and thus never redeem all of them (common with gift cards) was not good enough for their profit margins - they had to convert a sale into a theft. I didn't use Blockbuster much after that - a great strategy for building your consumer loyalty.