MooMooMooMoo

It seems like this board used to be a lot busier!

E Unit

When there were a lot more sales and media in general. I still look for a good deal, but 98% of the time I just Amazon it during sales. So little I search for these days, and just about all of it is 4K and the occasional Arrow special edition and the like for me. I ditched buying pretty much else. No more TV shows for the most part.

Abob Teff

Well, a year of no new releases pretty well killed off the remnants of a slowing industry. As they move away from physical media, stores just weren’t competing on new releases like they used to.

I miss the days of comparing sites, finding the best prices and the exclusives ... now it’s just buy it or don’t.

hariseldon

I have no idea, but people have literally been begging the companies to let up on the recent deluge of overlapping sales. So if you're buying 98% from Amazon something is different with your needs or selective memory (pretty like the post about halfway
through BF about how awful this year is compared to last followed up 2 week later with the lament of how poor I am b/c I bought so many cheap things I really didn't need -- year after year the same sequence)

Kino's had a sale (or 5 going) on since before BF
Shout Select just had a huge sale on the heels of a Boxset sale and a couple niche within a niche sales (the Current Corman sale for example)
WB 4/44 sale
Arrow Easter Carnage Sale
Grindhouse Video ArrowUS sale
Criterion 50% off Flash Sale.
Deep Discount had a ton of things on sale early March and a 15% off code. Not even including their Surplus reduction which had a bunch of price errors or 80-90% discounts -- some of which shipped
Zavvi's had a series of sales for the Birthday including a glitch that doesn't appear to be much of a glitch with 30-40 4K titles less than $10 each (the gliitch is allowing 3 for less than $30 instead of £30)
Zavvi's been doing their typical Disney/Marvel 2 for style deals. Amazon as well, but limit one pair per order and basically shipping 3-5 x pre-Covid pre- Political destruction of the international postal pricing tiers
Gruv (universal) has/had about 50 4K titles for 11 ea (2 for 22)
Powerhouse Indicator had a big sale
Target had a week long B2G1 sale and people had carts of up to 40-50 items


Best Buy and Walmart have mostly been sitting it out and of course Amazon is just putzing aroudn half way pricematching a few of the deals
The drastic increase in shipping costs (assuming they're even allowing US orders) from Amazon UK/EU has also drastically decreased the deal a lot of us used to participate from there

That's in addition to the lack of new movie release which has really hampered the NEW RELEASE bursts and in a First Quarter that usually is historically slow for deals anyway.

dex14

hariseldon being all it’s not us, it’s you...

Captsmee.00

This site used to be it. Way more activity on other sites nowadays unfortunately

dsa_shea

There might be more activity but is it really enjoyable being a part of it? I find some of the other sites that I read to be rather hateful with several arrogant posters. I find myself wanting to simply read posts rather than taking part in the discussion more often than not.

Why So Blu?

I partook from that Arrow UK Easter Carnage sale.

DJariya

2020 really had no major new releases because everything got shelved. So coming into this year there’s still really nothing worth noting coming out yet. I mean there’s only so many people here who want Criterion’s, Shout, and Kino catalog titles.

If you really want to partake in active and OCD discussion about sales and slip covers, you need to go to Blu-Ray.com.

Mike86

That’s how I feel too. There are busier websites, but I enjoy this particular community more than most for some reason. I feel like I know a lot of the personalities here so it feels like a home base or something.

Josh-da-man

Both.

There are fewer people buying disc-based movies these days than there were ten or fifteen years ago. And that means fewer retail outlets carrying fewer discs. The decreased demand for discs makes them a niche product, which drives up the prices and you don't have as many "sales" as you once did.

Most of the deals have moved online to a scant handful of retailers like Amazon, who don't do weekly sales like Best Buy or Circuit City did in the heyday. When Amazon runs a sale on something, it's likely to only last for a few days (or even hours) until their stock is depleted.

PhantomStranger

The problem is that the industry "leader" never actually has Blu-ray deals anymore unless they are price-matching Walmart, Target or Best Buy. Walmart is just not that concerned about their online sales and Best Buy is clearly transitioning away from all media.

About the best media deals over the past year or two have been Target's Buy2 Get1 free sales. Most of the energy in media discussion these days goes into cult and niche labels that aren't exactly mainstream.

DJariya

I mean how many of you here are dying to get the new Event Horizon special edition from Shout? A movie from 23 years ago that’s like $35 on BD? That’s the kind of “new” stuff that’s coming out right now. Niche and expensive catalog titles. Not exactly deal material.

SterlingBen

I check both here and the other site’s deal forum once or twice a day and yeah there is a lot less activity here year over year lately. It’s no secret that DVDTalk is dying, has been for awhile. If not for checking the deal forum and the OHMC I would probably go dark here as well...

Nick Danger

It's me and people like me. I used to wait with excitement for the next Deep Discount DVD sale. I'd buy a box of disks when good sales came along. Now, I'm not watching the disks I've got. I'm not sure if I've bought a new disk in the last two years.

cabler30

Not even sure if streaming has anything to do with it really. i have read stores have started to shrink the media areas or aisles and replaced with other stuff try get rid of i guess. so media is on shelf for shorter time then before and as u wait and try get the deals they start filling the dump bins or clearance areas or just tagging titles to be cheaper if see no titles start clearing any after a time i guess. traffic has for some or many go to other places now for the deals any. i may be wrong but dollar tree, biglots, thrift any, and other places selling some or movies and shows from past years for cheaper. or online for cheaper. so media is cheap , just gotta snag it when u see it for cheap. so i guess as more go to streaming sales be going more i guess.

milo bloom

All the big box stores are reducing their floor space for physical media (although Meijer seems to still have a lot) but on the other side of that the local Disc Replay just announced they’re moving to a bigger location. In addition to used DVDs and Blus, they also sell toys, comics, video game accessories, trading cards, all kinds of stuff.

MooMooMooMoo

Me too. This & 1 other site that has shut down are the only arts boards I've found without Trolls.

Captsmee.00

True that. I have ordered more discs than ever since BF because I didn’t know that Vinegar Syndrome, Severin or Synapse existed really and now I’m addicted to getting cult horror movies. There are a lot of good deals out there still,

cabler30

I personally dont buy from online cause not like using card online any. i guess i old fashion but rather go to a store to get a cheap price then have to wait for any by mail any. i guess some or many dont mind using a card for any reason, but i just rather be able and dig into a bin or other and still find good deals on old stuff by chance any. i have found some at walmart past years , but now have so much from variety places that i feel i got too much kinda and see or watch stuff online so not real check stores as much as before unless i there for needs and do a quick for any i really want real bad any.

clckworang

Yes, I've been coming here so long that it does feel like an online Cheers, even though I tend to do more lurking than talking.

As for deals, it's kind of the best of times and the worst of times. The Target sale is pretty awesome, but otherwise, there are more and more label sales, both on the label's actual website or a label-specific sale at a retail site. I've spent way too much during the pandemic but much less at Best Buy and the like than in years past.

clckworang

Adam Tyner

No argument there, but I do feel like the overwhelming majority of the best deals are posted here too. Maybe not as quickly, and certainly not prompting as much discussion, but I think someone could poke their head in on our deals forum and be pretty well-informed.

I feel like I've been trained to wait for the big sales, only the best sales tend to overlap...and since I'm very backlog-averse, I wind up buying very little (or nothing) during them.

walletboyniac

I will say there's a lot less bickering on this site vs. the "other" site. I don't know how many threads get clogged with people going back and forth about nothing over there.

I primarily buy boutique stuff these days, and I get my deals at the Salvation Army and the flea market. I think it's true a lot of deals have dried up, even on Amazon (so, does that mean no one has good prices if they have nothing to match?). I used to reliably find deals on Blu-ray.com, and boy, those are scarce now. I did drop $250 on movies with Target's buy 2 get 1 sale recently. Amazon's matching sale did not hold up (not trying to bash Amazon). I do get some deals on Hamilton as well.

And yes, I desperately want that new edition of Event Horizon, if it ever gets to a reasonable price. I didn't even bite on the pre-order price of $28.

SteveA

For me, it's not necessarily that there are fewer deals. Rather there are fewer movies that I don't have that I want to own. When I first started collecting DVDs in the late 90's, there was the entire universe of movies to choose from, and I wanted a lot. Eventually I collected most of the films from the past that I was interested in as they finally were released. And for many of them, I don't care enough to upgrade to Blu or 4K if they become available. So the universe is now limited to new movie releases, and the occasional classic film release that strikes my fancy. And there aren't that many new movies that I have to own.

Also, some of the quirky, hard-to-find titles of the past are now available on streaming platforms. Those who remember my posts over the decades here (and who would ever have enough brain storage for that?) might remember that I've always wanted a release of the 1982 movie Split Image. I wanted to see it again, and I would have gladly bought the DVD or Blu to do it. Now, I don't have to because it's available on Amazon Prime. Maybe it will vanish from Amazon some day, but that's OK because I got to see it again, which is all I really wanted. I'm sure there are other movies like that on streaming services too. I mean, I bought Mandingo, which I wouldn't have done if I could have just streamed it.