Video Business: DVD vs Blu-ray disc prices average a $10 difference

Interesting article. I can't wait for Skyhawk to call VB sore losers in the format war.

I don't know about the Digital Copy thing though. Not sure it's in such high demand.

Not all bd titles have Digital Copy, but if one does have it, is it worth 8 or 10 bucks more? I think not. We have discussed bd prices in a zillion threads. The whole thing is a reoccurring circular argument it all keeps coming back to price. Period. BD simply costs too much for most people.

Why would this be a surprise to anyone here other than Falcon?

DVD has reached an interesting stage, where Walmart and other stores now have several $5 throwaway bins. Our Walmart even has a 2 for $5 bin of catalog DVD selections! I paid $42 to get "The Thing" on DVD many years ago. It's not that price any more.

There was a time not long ago when DVDs cost much more than VHS tapes. Walmart had bins of $5 VHS tapes, then $2 tapes, then $1.... I saw my last bin of VHS tapes this Christmas at Zellers. I can't remember the price they were going for.

But if anyone (Falcon you listening?) believes that studios and retailers would simply replace the $5 and $10 DVDs in those throw away bins with Blu-ray equivalents for the same price, you have no idea about product introductions, adoption curves, or why studios were interested in introducing a high definition media format to begin with. DVD media is aged well past "noon", and the market is using the low margin, high volume approach that is always used during the down slope of a product cycle. The good news for those who feel HD isn't cost justifiable is that that down slope for DVD is going to last a long time - just as it lasted for VHS!

Meanwhile, yes a new Blu-ray catalog release may cost $25.00 while the same DVD title sitting in the Walmart bin may be retailing for $5 (that's a whopping $20 difference). But when the DVD format was on the uphill or peaking, that DVD probably cost more like... well... $25.00. And yes, during that same time there were hordes of people grabbing threw the $5 VHS bins.

When I look at the rows of $5 and especially the 2 DVDs for $5 bin at Walmart, I'm frankly surprised this article only calculated a $10 difference. Perhaps this has something to do with the lowered pricing of several BD catalog releases to under $20 in the big box & discount stores. If only DVD was as cheap at the same stage in its product cycle, my DVD collection would have cost MUCH less than it did.

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DVD media is aged well past "noon", and the market is using the low margin, high volume approach that is always used during the down slope of a product cycle. The good news for those who feel HD isn't cost justifiable is that that down slope for DVD is going to last a long time - just as it lasted for VHS!

Remember that VHS was replaced by a demonstrably superior format. It's much different this time: most consumers presently simply do not see BD as being even marginally superior to DVD. With VHS, the physical appearance of the media was different with SD/BD, the media looks the same but it's quite a bit more expensive. These are not analogous events and people are not going to jump on this bandwagon as quickly or enthusiastically they did with DVD.

I don't think SD has reached its peak, but it could if BD ever gets its act in order and prices down to realistic levels. So far they have shown little inclination to do so.

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most consumers presently simply do not see BD as being even marginally superior to DVD.

Even marginally, you say? Oh never mind... I wont even bother to go there...

Anyway, I guess consumers didn't find standard DVD as being even marginally superior to VHS in its 3rd year either - until DVD's 7th year when it finally exceeded unit sales of VHS with > 50% market share.

This is the first year of Blu-ray without the format war, and adoption is dependent on the consumer having an HDTV, and here we are in a recession - yet market share is already consistently over 10% versus DVD, and may be approaching 15% for Q1 2009.

And you better believe that the marketers are watching, analyzing sales value to price on a daily, weekly, etc. basis. These companies for example look at rental percentages to help determine the margins they can push. For example, it costs the same with many rental outlets to rent either DVD or BD, even though new release BDs are sold at a slight premium. If BD rental percentages to DVD exceeded BD sale percentages to DVD at a wide margin, this might indicate a price sensitivity signal.

All the arm chair marketing experts on this site (mostly former HD DVD fanboys) may think they're smarter than the best these multi-billion dollar corporations can hire, but I don't think so.

What pisses me off is that there at this date time only a handful of Blu-Ray titles worth investing into. Albeit HD Audio selections, and dramatic video improvements only effect a handful of selections. HD media advancements that really trigger my pocket book is the special adaptations and special features. For the most part, most of the fluff out there is satisfactory for DVD rentals. I mean, realistically in the last two weeks, I chose the DVD for most of my selections. Either A, the feature is not available on Blu-Ray, or B I cannot justify seeing a movie like "Burn After Reading" in HD. The DVD presentation was good enough. Don't get me wrong, I liked the movie but was it worth that much in HD? Now, I'm not saying that Blu-Ray isn't useless, I'm just saying that titles such as "IronMan, Dark Knight were worth their weight in HD.

Surprisingly enough, the new release sections at either Blockbuster or Rogers Video need some adjustments. I mean, four or five copies or the newest Blu-Ray movies, how are you supposed to rent anything? It's actually quite sad.

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I cannot justify seeing a movie like "Burn After Reading" in HD. The DVD presentation was good enough. Don't get me wrong, I liked the movie but was it worth that much in HD?

I can't justify buying that title for $27 in standard DVD either. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't a bad movie... just not something I will probably revisit outside of a later TV broadcast. It's a rental for me. But if the rental price is the same for BD and DVD (and it is with zip.ca), I'll go for the BD every time no matter what the movie is.

I don't think you need a CGI filled movie or one with amazing panoramic photography to benefit from HD. Oddly enough, the most popular movie lately that friends want to see at my house is Shawshank Redemption. And they're like "Oh WOW!". Funny that Shawshank was a must buy for me (triple dip?) in HD, yet Dark Knight was a rental.

Agreed that Rogers should get more new BD releases, especially those that fall in the middle of the popularity scale. At our neighborhood location, they might get 20 or 30 copies of Eagle Eye, yet only 2 Ghost Towns. WTF?

I was at BB last night going through the Blu's and DVDs, and yes, the average difference appeared to be around $10 from what I saw. Some of the Blu-rays are close to $40, and after sifting through Best Buy's Blu-ray library, I couldn't help but feel angry. I mean, I was boiling up mad over the stinking prices they think are fair! It made me want to track down the floor manager and give him/her a piece of my mind. I especially wanted to lose it right then and there when I saw the price of "Burn After Reading"(I did one of these: and a "You gotta' be kidding!" and basically said, "FAH Q SONY you bunch of book doctoring liars!") I just don't get how these jokers think the prices on these disc's fits the average price range of the average consumer when it does not!

Funny thing Tim. Next time your in Crockbuster, check out the Sony shit everywhere in the store. Blu-Ray Alarm clock radios(They don't play movies, but have logos on them), IPOO'D docking stations, PS3 Displays, Sony BDP-350 demo's with Blu-Ray VS DVD quality, Earphone, Cell Phones. It's actually quite humourous, how much they sold out to them. All of their movies in Blu-Ray were all conveniently prices at $34.99 or higher.

It's funny you mention the DVD vs bluray comparison demos. I was at Bestbuy a while back and watched a demo where they split screen and show the same movie with DVD on one side and bluray on the other.

The joke is they intentionally make DVD look REALLY bad to try and magnify the difference. I asked one of the sales guys since when does DVD look so soft and grainy? He told me that he didn't know and reminded me that he didn't make the video. lol

My point is that if you have to make DVD look bad to make HD look more appealling to consumers then it's obvious the product isn't the drastic improvement people want it to be, especially when you have really good upconverting DVD players on the market (another product that bluray has to compete with).

When DVD came into the market, the difference was very noticeable when compared to VHS, not even to mention it was on a digital disc that takes less space on your shelf, you got digital audio, the video quality would not degrade over time because it was on tape, no need to rewind, skip to the next chapter, etc, etc, etc.

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[Post edited by Falcon01 on Jan 4, 2009 - CST 10:40 AM]