Brent L

This may or may not be old news, I dunno, I haven't read this thread in a while.

Anyway, my local BBV is closing like many others, and I went in yesterday and they had stuff at 30% off. Just awful prices still. All Blu-rays are $7.99. So I was looking and I saw The Illusionist, the animated film, and I picked that one up at what I thought was a fair price before someone else grabs it at a deeper discount. Then I saw the Casablanca BD on the shelf still. I saw it before when the titles were $11.99 each but didn't even pick it up, hoping it would still be there for even cheaper. So I took Casablanca up to the counter with The Illusionist, and TI came up at the advertised $7.99 price, but then the checkout girl said hold on a second, this one is an exception. She said nope, this one used has a price of $30, and to buy it at the discount was around $16 or so she said. I obviously said no way and just left it for some other goober to pick up, if that even happens. Talk about a rip off.

I asked why it was so much more than all other BDs and she said because it's out of print, and that they now price OOP titles of all kinds accordingly, including used titles. How long has that been going on? For years I went to BBV and found OOP titles and bought them and they were never any more than normal prices. Good riddance to this awful company.

Manzana

I called my 2 closing stores again. One store is still at $7.99 (closing in April). The other store (closing in March) went from $4.99 to $3.99, but he said there's not much "good stuff" left in the used BDs.

Could anyone who browsed used BDs during the $4.99 and $3.99 prices at your closing Blockbusters tell me if you remember seeing very many BD titles that were not part of last year's 5 for $20 used BD deals?

While every store is different, I'm going to guess the same pattern will occur at any Blockbuster store. I'm still debating if it's worth making a special trip (almost 15 miles out of my way) to the $3.99 store where I worry I won't find much worth buying and feel it's a wasted trip. Maybe the best time to go is when the BDs first hit $4.99?

If it's the latter, I'll have to keep a closer eye when the $7.99 store hits $4.99 as that store is much closer. I still have another 5 or so stores in my area that aren't on the closing list yet, and I assume all Blockbusters are closing in the near future, so I hope I'll have more opportunities in the future.

creekdipper

They probably thought they were being nice. Last year when a bunch of BB closed, they wanted $50+ for Casablanca. It was fun seeing the look of disbelief on a person's face when she was told the price (I had just returned the BD to the shelf after my trip to the checkout with it).

You can pre-order the Ultimate Edition of it for around $43 right now, and it will probably drop to $30 or so later on if Ben Hur, Wizard, and other special editions are any yardstick.

mattysemo247

Any chance we can keep store conversations in this thread?

http://forum.dvdtalk.com/store-forum...st-here-9.html

Every time I see this thread bumped, I keep hoping to see that they added new titles for the 5 for $20 sale. I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Schloob1

Well my store that is closing at the end of March had just dropped to $2.99 a couple days ago and I was there last night and the paper sleeves were still that price. Call me shocked when I went in tonight to drop off a moive and they went down to the magic price for me of $1.99, with the deal of 5 for $7.50 Needless to say I think I ended up with a pretty good selection of titles with a few OK movies thrown in due to being so cheap.

Black Swan
Boogie Woogie
Burn After Reading
Cop Out
Couples Retreat
Crazy Heart
Delicatessen
The Dilemna
The Eagle
Flipped
Forgetting Sarah Marshall
Ghost Town
Hall Pass
Hellboy 2
Hoodwinked Too!
Horton Hears a Who
It's Kind of a Funny Story
Killers
The King's Speech
Little Fockers
Micmacs
Middle Men
Monsters vs Aliens
My Best Friends Girl
Nick and Norah's Infinite Playist
Nowhere Boy
Paprika
Race to Witch Mountain
Semi-Pro
She Out of My League
Smokin Aces 2
The Soloist
THe Spiderwick Chronicles
True Grit (2010)
Up in the Air

35 Blu's for just under $56

duganrm

nice haul. There is only 1 store in my area with sleeve blu and they don't have the selection you found.

Schloob1

Sounds like the other store that I had closing by me. They had about 200 blu's in sleeves. Only problem was it was only about 10 titles, 30 copies of which was Dinner for Schmucks. And amazingly at the store I got my movies at tonight did not even have any copies of that film, go figure.

Manzana

I didn't realize that nice list of BDs were all "sleeve" titles. I thought they were just $2.99 BDs left on the shelf. Besides these sleeve titles, were there many good BDs left at $2.99?

Nobody commented on my earlier post, but I have a feeling that I blew it not going to my closing store (which is far away for me) as soon as their used BDs hit $4.99. Now that it has been 1.5 weeks since then and the employee claimed there wasn't much good stuff left yesterday, I still can't decide if it's worth the extra drive next Monday which is the first time I'm even going out that direction. I was hoping people would tell me that at $3.99 there were still some good BDs left that were not part of 5 for $20.

Speaking of sleeve BDs, none of the stores I called in my area mentioned having any sleeve BDs... just sleeve DVDs.

Regarding mattysemo247's comment, AFAIK the 5 for $20 sale is long over and there's very little current discussion in the other thread, so I think it's appropriate to continue to discuss store closing sales here even though the title isn't right. The truth is it doesn't matter to me which thread it's discussed in... I'm going to pick the thread that has the most current activity.

Schloob1

The $2.99 at least at my store actually lasted less than a week which is what shocked me. At that price point pretty much everything was still left when I had looked at it. I think only only about 3 titles that I wanted had been bought at that point that were there when they were $3.99.

Only bad part right now is that the Blu's in cases are still at $5.99

As far as the other stores by you with just sleeve DVD's, that might be the case or you just got a clueless employee. Because at least at my store the signs advertising all the sleeve titles all say DVD, just that there is section for all the Blu's with a DVD sign as well. That could be what the people you talked to were thinking.

Mao

Couple of weeks ago, I drove to one of the only closings in Denver on their last day...only to find...

A massive amount of Blus....

For $5.99.


Ummmm.

duganrm

There is no way for us to know what kind of stock your store has left vs what you want to find. Each store is going to be random based on the people that shop there. Basically anything that was on the shelf has some sort of chance of still being available.

Sleeve BD were rare in the closing stores. I only found them at 2 of the 12 that closed here.

If you are lucky enough to have a blockbuster still open near you, they are running a 5 for $20 deal now (on $9.99 or less titles) or 3 for $20 (on titles under $14.99). As it seems like they will basically close all the stores by the end of the year, not sure how much longer the deal will last. I just found another store near me that will start the closing process on monday.

Manzana

Thanks for the info. I wouldn't expect anyone to know what kind of stock my closing stores have, but I'd expect most Blockbusters across the US to be pretty similar in what they carry and most people pretty similar in what they buy. One big potential difference is I live near a large city (which I rarely enter) so it's a densely populated area and stores tend to be cleaned out faster than if I lived out in the "boonies". I don't expect the latest new releases to be left, but I'd love to pick up some odd catalog titles cheap that never were part of the 5 for $20 deal last year.

I didn't realize 5 for $20 was still going on, but last time I checked the 5 for $20 (probably 2-4 months ago... time blends together) at a few different stores there was not a single title I wanted (I either already had them all from previous Blockbuster sales or didn't want them). I just wanted to get an idea if other people are still finding good BDs (not sleeve ones as those are rare) once the prices hit $3.99 or less. Schloob1 had good luck with sleeve BDs, but I've been told there are none at my stores. As all stores near me have closed, the remaining ones are all "special trips" several miles out of my commute path so I don't normally go into them to look around as I hate wasting time and gas. The last time I entered a Blockbuster was around New Year's. It sounds like I should make a trip soon.

I guess we now have a non 5 for $20 sale Blockbuster discussion thread here, but not many people are posting there yet: http://forum.dvdtalk.com/blu-ray-bar...ad-2012-a.html

Schloob1

Careful of that thought process. Between 5 blockbusters in a 10 mile radius of me are usually very different in what seems to be popular or not of what they have in stock in terms of used blus whether the store is closing or not. I understand you trying to get a feel for what's out there, but ultimately it is YMMV, especially in the used market so one ultimately has to decide for themselves to go take a look and run the risk of either scoring big or getting a big old goose egg.

Schloob1

Picked up 5 more sleeves today, done with those for sure now. Now just waiting for the price drop in the case titles. Those are still at $5.99

Armored
Astro Boy
Crank 2
The Express
Ocean Origins

Hethunder

have the sleeves you guys found blu or just dvd? my closest closing store was just dvd and prices still 5.99 there as well. but i doubt ill be going back, there wasn't anything i wanted. i did get 15 empt dvd cases for 3 $ though. but that was about it.

duganrm

All stores seem to have dvds, only a small amount of those stores have blus as well. So far I have only found them at 2 out of 11 stores.

Hethunder

alright thanks for the info.

b2net

The Grand Blanc store had some Blu Sleeve titles some time back.. stuff like Batman Superman Public Enemies, My Sister's Keeper, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, Green Lanter First Flight, etc... they were like 2.99 each or 3 for $6...

Which other store in the area is closing or are you referring to Grand Blanc?

Hethunder

just grand blanc. the only one close to me thats closing. was this recently you are talking about? i probably just missed it. superman/batman public enemies would have been cool.

Jtnguyen12

Stopped by BBV today & picked up 20 Blu-ray movies for $62.XX after taxes ($2.99 Each). Just picked up all the Good titles for now. I'll come back next week and hope it drop down $1.99 Each for older movies.

b2net

Grand Blanc a few weeks ago...Sleeve titles...

Manzana

I finally forced myself to drive out of my way to the closing Blockbuster (in a few weeks) where used BDs went to $2.99 today. I was sadly disappointed by the selection. It was almost precisely the 5 for $20 titles last year with maybe 30 titles I hadn't seen before. I bought about a dozen (all blind buys) and decided I wouldn't waste my time going back there even if everything were $1. There were a few sleeve DVDs (mostly The Lost Boys: The Tribe) that I could care less about and no sleeve BDs. I had to laugh at the game guides for 10% off. I remember HW Video had game guides for 80-90% off in the last week where they worked out to $1-$2 each.

The BDs I hadn't seen in the 5 for $20 before are: BangBang Club, Dragon Crusaders, Knucklehead, Sympathy for Delicious, and Bangkok Adrenaline, none of which sounded interesting so I passed. BDs which I'd seen before in the 5 for $20 but which I passed on today for $2.99 were: Frost Nixon, Private Lives of Pippa Lee, Sorority Row, Sublime, TellTale, Locked Down, Rest Stop, Persepolis, Hostel II, Lottery Ticket, For Colored Girls, Witless Protection, Pink Panther 1 & 2, Last Exorcism, Surveillance, One Missed Call, Things We Lost in the Fire, Megafault, and Trespass. I've never seen any of them except the Pink Panthers. Pretty much everything else in the BD section I either knew I didn't want or already had. These all sales final Blockbuster used BD sales are about the only time I really wish I had a smart phone with Internet access to read reviews, but then I'd be in the store for hours reading.

So, clearly at $2.99 there's mostly just junk left. I'm guessing at $3.99 that's pretty much the case too. Anything over $6.99 is just too expensive for a used BD considering so many new BDs can be found at Cancelzon for $7-$10 if you wait 1-2 years after release. I might pay $6.99 for certain new releases used BDs but I bet others would buy them before they get to $6.99. That leaves $4.99-$5.99 as the only real range where they might be a few decent things I want. So I'm keeping my eyes out for $4.99 (or $5.99) at the other store closing in April.

BTW, do Blockbuster prices always change at closing stores on Monday (and only on Monday)?

joltman

???

Manzana

Cancelzon = Amazon. I'll keep using that term until I'm less mad at them maybe later this year. I recently had a bunch of cheap CD orders canceled by them (hence Cancelzon) after they said for over 2 weeks they'd ship them soon. I even called twice to check order status and was assured I'd get them only to be sent a barrage of cancel emails on the day they were supposed to ship. They handled this very poorly (it was widely discussed on SD when it happened), and their reaction afterwards was pretty poor too. Some people got all of their orders. Other people like me got little or nothing for the time wasted ordering stuff we thought was on sale. Right before they did this they canceled 2 other orders I had due to "price mistakes" as well. The difference was those orders were canceled within 1-2 days whereas they waited 2 weeks on the other ones. So I figure anything I order at Cancelzon is likely to be a price mistake and canceled.

Schloob1

I'll agree with you on everything you passed on was junk except this right here. That would have been a GREAT score at that price.