Redbox Gets Bought: Another Success For Good Service At A Good Price

from the doing-things-the-right-way dept

Fri, Feb 13th 2009 3:11pm — Carlo Longino

Redbox, the company that rents DVDs out of automated kiosks for $1 per night, has been bought for up to $176 million by its biggest investor, Coinstar. It was hard to dislike Redbox: the company was having a lot of success in a space where other companies hadn't, by creating a convenient and easy to use service that delivered at a great price. Plus, anything that gets Hollywood's knickers in an enormous twist generally is pretty good. Universal Studios, in particular, tried to hamper Redbox through threats leading to lawsuits (update: clarified that Redbox filed the lawsuit... in response to a threat from Universal), perhaps hoping to kill the company off before launching rental kiosks of its own. But rather than try to destroy Redbox, Hollywood (and plenty of other people) should learn from it: the way to success isn't by putting all sorts of obstacles in the way of your customers' happiness, it's by providing them a service they want, delivered in an easy way, with a lot of value.

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Filed Under: dvds, good service, mergers
Companies: coinstar, redbox

10 Comments

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Copyrights & Campaigns, 13 Feb 2009 @ 4:02pm

It was Redbox, not Universal, that sued
"Universal Studios, in particular, tried to hamper Redbox through lawsuits..."

Actually, it was *Redbox* that sued Universal:
http://www.eff.org/files/Redbox%20v%20Universal_Complaint.pdf
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Mike (profile), 13 Feb 2009 @ 4:35pm

Re: It was Redbox, not Universal, that sued
Yes, in response to a threat from Universal. So, hardly a difference that matters. Either way I added an update to Carlo's post to clarify.
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gtpeach, 13 Feb 2009 @ 5:26pm

oh boy. get ready the 8 cent per every dollar upcharge coinstar takes from is machines might end up appearing somehow in our cheap dvds. :( i bet they can free dvd monday too.
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Rekrul, 15 Feb 2009 @ 6:24am

My friend bought a movie from a Redbox machine. He bought The Water Horse because he wanted all the special features. After paying his $7, he was disappointed to find that he only received the disc with the movie on it and not the supplemental DVD that comes with all other releases of the film. He hasn't bought or rented anything from them since.
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Dumb, 15 Feb 2009 @ 12:09pm

Re:
Well, i mean i bet it didn't tell him it came with all the special features and what not. Why wouldn't he rent from them still? Its a great service
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Anonymous Coward, 15 Feb 2009 @ 3:07pm

So none of the pro-IP guys want to come over here and talk about how Redbox is stealing? How their cheap distribution is going to bankrupt hollywood?

None of that? Perhaps you guys want to argue that Redbox should be illegal? I mean, if big copyright doesn't like it, it must be bad for the country right?
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duh, 16 Feb 2009 @ 2:23pm

Re:
Your friend (which we assume is you) is an idiot. Did you think it was going to give you the fancy box and paper inserts too?
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Rekrul, 16 Feb 2009 @ 7:07pm

Well, i mean i bet it didn't tell him it came with all the special features and what not. Why wouldn't he rent from them still? Its a great service

No, in fact it didn't say much beyond the movie description. However, since every single DVD release of the film includes two discs, it stands to reason that when Redbox bought their copies, they got the second discs for each one. It's not so outrageous to believe that they would include both discs rather than just chuck a few million copies of the second disc. And yes, the copies they had were from the 2-disc releases because the movie disc was labelled as Disc 1.

Your friend (which we assume is you) is an idiot. Did you think it was going to give you the fancy box and paper inserts too?

You assume incorrectly. There are very few movies I like enough to spend money on and if there is one, I'll wait until I can buy a normal retail copy from the bargain bin or the local flea market. Most of the time, I'd just download it.

And as I pointed out above, there was no reason to assume that the second disc wouldn't be included. Redbox could easily fit two discs in their kiosk boxes.
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Omar, 26 Jul 2009 @ 1:26am

hollywood rocks!
YES, I AGREE THAT REDBOX IS CHEAPER, BUT THEY DO NOT OFFER CONCESSIONS AND GREAT RECOMMENDATIONS LIKE HOLLYWOOD VIDEO.
AND 5 DAY RENTAL FOR ONLY 4.29 SO TECHNICALY ITS CHEAPER THEN REDBOX AND OFFER MORE DAYS TO KEET YOUR RENTAL!
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steve, 30 Nov 2012 @ 5:12pm

theres a free guide how to get a Redbox at
redboxprofits.com/intro
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