Reply With Quote
Actually I just rent movies thru AT&T video on demand.............its easy, quick and you dont have to return anything. Yeah, it costs a bit more, but you can get the movie in HD and you dont have to drive anywhere to return it.
@beauton_deax frm TWEETDECK @ purstalk @ SPURSTAWK
;; adaptation must adapt, reserves will be met,.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Blockbuster is in a heap of troublewith nearly $1 billion in debt, and its latest fixes might not be enough to keep the company from filing for bankruptcy.
The movie rental company launched its newest enterprise on Wednesday, beating rival Netflix to the punch in mobile movies. Blockbuster is now offering on demand video via T-Mobile's new HTC HD2 smart phone. The new service is also expected to be available on Android and Windows Mobile phones soon.
That news follows the company's announcement on Tuesday that it signed a new agreement with movie studio Warner Bros., which is owned by CNNMoney.com's parent company Time Warner (TWX, Fortune 500). The deal will continue to allow Blockbuster to offer the studio's new releases about a month before its chief compe ors, Netflix (NFLX) and Coinstar's (CSTR) Redbox.
Blockbuster's latest moves are steps in the right direction. But to overcome nearly $1 billion in debt, unprofitable stores and continued losses, what the company really needs is a major turnaround. Blockbuster said last week it may have to file for bankruptcy protection if it cannot lower its debt by other means.
"Blockbuster is trying to keep itself from bleeding to death, but they're putting on a lot of Band-Aids," said Michael Pachter, Blockbuster analyst at Wedbush Morgan Securities.
Blockbuster (BBI, Fortune 500) did not return multiple requests for comment.
Struggling for survival
Blockbuster has been saddled with massive debt since media conglomerate Viacom (VIA) spun the company off in 2004. As part of the deal, Blockbuster had to pay Viacom shareholders a $5 per-share dividend, and the movie rental company ac ulated about $1 billion of debt in the process.
At the time, the company was making profits of about $500 million a year, so Blockbuster assumed that it would be able to pay down that debt quickly. But questionable business decisions -- like canceling all late fees -- ate into the company's profits.
So did Netflix.
0:00 /0:56Know what you're not doing
As Netflix's movies by mail and streaming video services began to catch on in the last decade, Blockbuster was unable to catch up. By the time Blockbuster's competing service, Blockbuster Mail, launched in 2004, Netflix had already been around for six years and had became synonymous with movies by mail.
"Asking if Blockbuster can compete with Netflix online is like asking if Best Buy can compete with Amazon online," said Pachter. "The answer is no. It doesn't matter how well capitalized you are, if the branding isn't there, you're not going to be able to compete."
Blockbuster is also taking aim at Redbox, launching a new partnership with NCR to place 10,000 DVD kiosks around the country by the end of the year. But competing will be difficult: Redbox already has 20,000 kiosks in place, and the company's revenues rose a whopping 99% in 2009.
Solutions
Despite its failure to catch up to the compe ion so far, Blockbuster may not be a lost cause.
While rumors continue to circulate about aNetflix iPhone application
(i bet it's only for 3gs models. maybe the new OS in the next gen version), Blockbuster got to market first today with mobile movies. The new service allows users to download movies to buy or rent, similar to Apple's (AAPL, Fortune 500) iTunes service. Eventually, customers will be able to watch a movie on their phone, and then pick up where they left off on their Blockbuster On Demand enabled TV or Blu-ray player.
Analysts applaud Blockbuster for trying the new venture, but they say its impact will be minimal. Pachter said he expects the company's mobile service will add no more than $5 million to Blockbuster's revenues. Last year, Blockbuster lost $355 million on revenues of $4.1 billion.
To solve its debt problems, Blockbuster has to get its core in-store retail business stabilized. One way the company is doing that is by continuing to shut down underperforming stores. By the end of the year, the company will operate about 3,000 stores in the United States, down from about 4,500 at the start of 2009.
But analysts say the deal with Warner Bros. is the most encouraging news the company has had in a while. In addition to giving Blockbuster a one-month head start over Netflix and Redbox on new releases, the terms of the deal will also ease the company's financial strain.
"There's still demand for physical video stores, but that will go away if Blockbuster were to fail," said Charles Wolf, Blockbuster analyst at Needham & Co. "The movie studios realize that, and they realize that there is an important role to be played by Blockbuster's stores."
Though the financial terms of the deal weren't released, Pachter said the revenue-sharing agreement will allow Blockbuster to pay less money up front for its inventory of movies, and in turn, it will give Warner Bros. a higher percentage of revenues from the rentals.
"That's the right idea," Pachter said. "Blockbuster will gladly sacrifice profitability if they can have more cash up front to pay down their debt."
It's surprising how slowly they are trying to do this. It seems a new red box pops up somewhere new every day. , the Walgreens down the street now has two of them.
The cool thing I just recently realized about red box is that no matter which redbox you initially use to rent the dvd, you can return it to any other redbox.
Blockbuster: Warner Bros Pact Retains New-Release Advantage
Blockbuster Inc. (BBI) has reached an agreement allowing it to continue renting out new-movie releases from Time Warner Inc.'s (TWX) Warner Bros. as soon as they are available for sale on DVD or Blu-ray.
The pact means the movie-rental giant will retain a roughly four-week advantage over by-mail subscription service Netflix Inc. (NFLX) and Coinstar Inc.'s (CSTR) Redbox DVD kiosk operator for new Warner Bros. DVDs, such as the Oscar-winning film, "The Blind Side," due out Tuesday.
Blockbuster on Monday didn't release terms of the new pact but said the revenue-sharing arrangement will provide Blockbuster with more copies of new movies to rent through its roughly 6,500 stores and its by-mail service.
"With this agreement, we are able to nearly double the units per store for both 'The Blind Side' and 'Sherlock Holmes,'" which will be released March 30, the company said in an email statement Monday night. "While the terms are confidential ... the studio partner stands to gain from an increased number of transactions with this agreement."
link
The advertisements for the exclusive rental rights are very Miller/Budweiser-esque.
And nothing of value was lost.
What's even funnier about this is that employees hafta answer the phone with "Thank you for calling Blockbuster on ______ Rd, the only place you can rent The Blind Side. This is _____. How may I help you?"
However, the stock BB's shipped each weak keeps decreasing. For example, the BB in Hickory Creek received less than 100 copies of TBS, so one may be forced to add "the only place you can rent The Blind Side (as long as you hurry tha UP)..."
You can reserve dvds on redbox too. I'd use Netflix if I had more time to really watch movies.
I happened across a Hollywood Video a few months back and practically bought their whole Classics section for under $50 I think. I then caught on that all these stores are in trouble, visited a Blockbuster for the same closing and saw the crap they were shlepping.
Just like an earlier poster said, they seem to get the crappiest of DVD from other stores during their Liquidation Sales and so you see entire racks of the same crappy movies in every section. It's actually hard not to laugh at, even though real jobs are being lost there.
I've heard longer phrases
it would suck if it's the holidays and you have a long street name and even longer real name.
happy holidays thank you for calling Blockbuster on Rumpelstiltskin Rd, the only place you can rent The Blind Side. This is Chuey Montemayor De La Cruz Jr.. How may I help you?
I would hang up and call back just so I could hear that again
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)
Posting Permissions
