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Netflix Kills Qwikster

Posted by samzenpus on from the on-second-thought dept.

gclef writes "Netflix has apparently decided that spinning off their DVD business into a separate organization was a bad idea after all, and is killing off the 'Qwikster' concept. From the article: 'Less than a month ago, the Netflix said it would split the DVD rental business off on a new website, to be called Qwikster. Subscribers howled at the move, saying they saw Netflix as a destination for movies in general and didn’t want to manage two accounts. “It is clear that for many of our members two websites would make things more difficult, so we are going to keep Netflix as one place to go for streaming and DVDs,” CEO Reed Hastings said in the blog post.'"

4 of 253 comments (clear)

  1. Too little, too late by g051051 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It's obvious that NetFlix doesn't understand its customers anymore (if it ever did.) What I used to take as excellent customer focused strategy now seems to have been completely accidental. Every customer facing change they've made over the past few years has made the NetFlix experience progressively worse. At this point, I've had enough of their confused thrashing, and will still be cancelling my subscription. I checked my records, I joined NetFlix in 2004, and used to have a 3 DVD plan, but inf recent years have dropped to 1 DVD, then no DVDs, and now, no NetFlix.

    1. Re:Too little, too late by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Their actions were affected by their tumbling stock price and customer mass exodus.

  2. Re:"Quikster" split a dumb move to begin with by glassware · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Netflix subscribed to a management theory called "eating your own lunch." The idea is that any business, if you wait around long enough, will get mummified as you keep trying to protect the revenue generated by your ancient business model. The theory says that, as the big company keeps struggling to keep its moribund business alive, a younger, hungrier competitor with a slightly different business model will steal your lunch. So, the theory goes, you should eat your own lunch and embark on your own variant business models. That way, when the business world shifts, you'll still be in business.

    The theory points to such past projects as the CD industry, Blockbuster, and others. The idea is that such industries failed because they were too wedded to their ideas to change.

    The trouble is, Netflix went overboard. They had two different business models running perfectly smoothly side by side. There was no mummification, nothing preventing them from being innovative or seizing on the new streaming business. In fact, their DVD-by-mail business was helping them wield great power in the movie industry, and helping them to get deals for streaming content.

    So if they were paying attention clearly, the only reason to kill off the DVD-by-mail business is if it was scaring off the customers, starving the company of funds, or somehow preventing innovation. None of those were true. I'm glad to see they came to their senses.

  3. Dumpster by thomasmoreorless · · Score: 5, Funny

    Dumpster: the new service for cleaning up after a mess like Qwikster.