Big Worms

Lately I have been seeing a lot of people talking about preorders. Do people prefer this way of getting new releases? Personally I just wait to the week they come out. I feel that I get the better deal that way.

tjn007

I assume you mean pre-order. It really depends if you think the best price will be the week it comes out. Many time a pre-order on-line price will beat a store price the week of release. Case in point: Star Wars Box set.

I picked up this baby for 34.99 from Amazon.com with the STL discount and a 3.00 discount from a joint purchase with THX1130.
The local stores on release week had the set for 42.99 and above. I'll save 8 bucks all day long especailly with this addiction. When you factor in tax and gas it over 10 bucks.

With a little effort, you can get saving like this all the time and it pays to pre-order (most of the time). The other option is waiting until the price dips or you get 2 fer deal. That could take many months if not over a year. With Star Wars I didn't think I would do better than 35 anyway.

Let your fingers do the walking and save the gas.

eau

It's a good idea to preorder if you have GC to burn anyway

Most retailers will allow you to cancel a preorder if you find out it's cheaper elsewhere before it ships. Preordering is a way to set in the price.

kayak99

I pre-ordered at FYE to get a) good rebate and b) free posters. Ples, at teh time you could buy $50 GC's and get another $10 one free.


My net SW was around $30 if I recall.

mgicash

Or in the case of the seinfeld gift set where you get a free $25 digital coupon for preordering

majorjoe23

Thanks for the great bargain! I preordered 50!

Big Worms

So do people tend to preorder big releases and not the smaller ones?

illennium

With STL, most preorders at Amazon are 37% off MSRP with free shipping and no tax. Usually, that's the best deal going.

Son-volt

I almost always preorder boxes through Amazon. With STL their price never gets beat, and I almost always get the item the day after street. If, on a rare occasion I do see a better price, I can always cancel. However, in the last six or eight months the only time that has happened is with the DDD 20% off. Other than that, preorder with Amazon STL has been the way to go.

darkside

Exactly. I buy mostly stuff that is not mainstream and won't get a big sale price at Best Buy. Amazon is the only way to go to get a decent price.

Numes

I pre-order almost everything, I don't discriminate between "big releases" and "small releases"

As mentioned before. I have rarely ever seen a B&M have a dvd or box set for less than I got it on-line for. Plus, you have to pay tax at a B&M (well, in most states you do). Amazon w/STL is where I buy almost all of my box sets. You can't beat it very often, plain and simple (although I am holding out for a DDD 20% off sale this winter, fingers crossed).

I will say though, DVDSoon.com has some insane prices (low) for their pre-orders the further they are away from release.

Son-volt

I personally do not tend to preorder small releases because I'm patient enough to wait and get them for significantly cheaper by maximizing my purchase dollars in a dvd club. Of course, not all movies come out through the clubs, but a lot do. I'd rather hold off on preordering the new Harry Potter for 16 bucks or so when I know I can bundle it in a club deal and wind up paying under fifty bucks for 8 movies. The clubs tend to have a much thinner selection of box sets, particularly tv show season, so I go the Amazon/STL route for those.

Frankly, this site has turned me into a real price snob when it comes to buying movies. I used to hit Best Buy and the local competitors once a week for DVD's. I bet I've bought 300 movies in the last 18 months, and the handful that I actually bought from brick-and-mortar stores are ones I had first confirmed that I couldn't find online cheaper first.

Bill Needle

Nice way to put it.

DonnachaOne

I pre-order on COlumbia House because it saves me two bucks on a DVD - $19.95 for a fulfillment instead of $21.95.

nrose101

CH is great unless you want to get a BV title or Universal title.

(they have not added any new universal titles to there system and it is questionalbe if they are)

chente

I do that too. The only problem is that you can't pre-order Columbia titles on their site for some reason.

DonnachaOne

Chente, I've found that Columbia titles are often $19.95 on release day.

matome

I like to get my discs on time so I preorder from DVDEmpire and pay Priority so they are on my doorstep every Monday. No needless trips to Best Buy just to find out they sold out/didn't get in the smaller titles in my order.

Decker

I rarely preorder anymore. Back in the good old days of Free Ride I would rack up tons of GC's and Reel.com would have up swimming in coupons. Most sites then had all pre-orders for 40% off (some big pre-orders like The Matrix were 50% off) and deals were unavoidable.
Thse days you'll still find the occasional good deal at Amazon if you use STL (LOTR : ROTK EE can be purchased for $21 with STL, less than you'll find it in any store, probably ever; slightly better deal on the Disney Treasures than you can get at any B & M).
It's mainly the bigger ticket items like box sets and Criterions that never go on sale that work out to be a better deal that way. I wish I would have preordered that Classic Monster Set a few months ago...

Jericho

I also pre-order a lot on non-mainstream titles. I pretty much know what will and won't be discounted in a given week. Combining tax free prices, free shipping, and a coupon will easily make many titles cheaper.

As for mainstream titles, I just pick them up at Walmart, which is almost always the cheapest.

mike1977

I preordered The Day After Tomorrow from the Fox Store and I got it today by UPS (10/6). My total was $20.75, $1.21 less than DDD.

dvdirv

My big gripe is with vendors like Deep Discount. They offer very little incentive for pre-ordering.

What DDD does is to price items higher prior to street date and then when the release hits, they will lower their price. Of course, you will not get the lower price unless you contact them for a price match.

In most cases, they will price match your order, but you first have to make the contact.

Personally I don't need the extra hassle of contacting them and then waiting for a price match. It's just simpler to visit a local vendor and buy at a good price in the first place.

Big Worms

Why preorder than for this price? I know it will be a lot cheaper first week of release at the B&M stores. Was it becuase you wanted to get it early?

tjn007

I agree with you. $20.75 is no real bargain when you consider the pricing at most stores on release day will be less than $20. For myself, on single release titles, the saving would need to be significant enough to buy on-line as opposed to picking up at the store. Of course you would need to factor in convenience, cost of gas and tax to come to that conclusion. I will not go out of my way to buy a title at a store to save a couple of dollars if the added cost like gas and tax will negate any savings. You just need to use common sense. On-line purchasing is great and is usually the most competitive but the vender and shipping (cost and condition) factor into those decisions. I would say on larger cost items such as Box Sets, Criterions and Ultra Special Editions, those I purchase on-line and single titles at the store (on the way home or to some other designation).

The worst case scenario would be not buy the DVD until a better price comes out. My general rule of thumb is to save anywhere between 35-50% off the title. Anyone who pays full price or near full price either doesn't know any better, doesn't care or is just a compulsive buyer. Pre-ordering should give incentives to save a significant amount over the list price; you just need to know where to look.