Stores Disposing Of Disposable DVDs

from the gee,-that-was-a-tough-one-to-call dept

When Disney first announced plans back in May to sell disposable DVDs, we were a bit surprised. Many companies have tried and failed (usually miserably) at offering disposable DVDs. There are plenty of lessons to be learned from the space - and "don't bother" seems to be a big one. Disney went ahead with the plans anyway, and in October, the report was that they weren't selling. At all. Beyond the general problems with the idea, someone who no longer deserves a job in marketing, decided to price the discs at $7. Note that the competition here is a rental movie - which gives the user more control and rights at about half the price. I wonder why people weren't buying... Now comes the completely unsurprising news that stores are beginning to throw away the unopened disposable DVDs themselves and offering up the lucrative shelf-space to someone who has a product shoppers might actually want to buy.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    Spelling police!, 29 Jan 2004 @ 5:34am

    renal movies

    This sounds like rather painful competition.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. identicon
    Oliver Wendell Jones, 29 Jan 2004 @ 6:37am

    Two audiences

    I see two potential audiences for these types of movies.

    #1) People who have more money then they know what to do with - People who are willing to spend $7 for what is essentially a time-limited movie rental. These people also have to have children who only want to watch a Disney movie once or twice and never again. My guesstimate is that there are approximately 41 people in the USA that fit this target demographic.

    #2) People who have DVD(+/-)R(W) drives and/or a DVD Recorder who will buy the movie, take it home and immediately copy it (using DVD-Shrink on their PC or a Macrovision blocker on their DVD Recorder), throw away the time-limited disc and put their almost perfect duplicate in the DVD case that came with the time-limited disc. Although a larger potential target than #1, a majority of these people would just as soon save themselves $3-4 and RENT the movie and copy it and make their own box.

    For those interested in #2, Target has been selling 10 packs of TDK brand DVD cases for $7, and you can easily find the DVD liners for a zillion movies at http://www.cdcovers.cc

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Beck, 29 Jan 2004 @ 7:17am

    Price?

    Instead of throwing them out, I wish they would reduce the price to see if that is the reason why they are not selling.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. identicon
    aNonMooseCowherd, 29 Jan 2004 @ 8:00am

    Re: Price?

    Instead of throwing them out, I wish they would reduce the price to see if that is the reason why they are not selling.

    This sounds so obvious that one has to wonder whether the stores had to agree not to sell them for less than a certain price.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. icon
    Mike (profile), 29 Jan 2004 @ 8:46am

    Re: renal movies

    It certainly does... which is why it's been changed. Thanks!

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Jeremiah, 29 Jan 2004 @ 9:09am

    disposable media?

    From a larger perspective, i don't really understand the point of "disposable" media. I mean, isn't the point of owning a DVD the fact that you want to KEEP the thing?

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    Billy, 18 Apr 2008 @ 5:50pm

    Re: Two audiences

    Actually, those aren't defined markets. Truly, the only market I could see these working in. Is while on a plane or train or somewhere secluded. Think RV camping park. Forcing scarcity is the only way you could sell something this stupid for that much money. However, this would mean you would have to keep a big inventory or at least some major new releases.

    Still those are very niche markets and would be silly to go into a physical distribution business at this point. With wireless technology revolutionizing everything right now and all.

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.