How Best Buy Advertises the Next Gen Formats
 

I found this amusing. From Bestbuy.com:

http://www.the-watercooler.com/bestbuy.jpg

Note that the Blu Ray link is bolded. HD DVD, which is not in bold, must clearly be inferior. Secondly, you can get great movies that'll really show off your equipment on Blu Ray like Superman Returns! All HD DVD has is dreck like You Me and Dupree.

What a joke.

I bought 4 HD DVDs yesterday to take advantage of their deal. Saw another guy there with a big handful of HD DVD titles. I used to not see anyone looking at either format, but the past few times I've been in BB, I see a couple of people getting HD DVD movies. My Best Buy is also one of the newer setup stores. They used to have BD on one side, and HD DVD split to where it shared 1 side with BD and the other side by itself. They've now re-arranged it to where 1 full aisle has nothing but HD DVD and BD movies. Looks nice having 1 large aisle dedicated to high-def.

Not only that, but this aisle is right behind their new release section, which is front and center facing the entrance. It's in a prime location.

Best Buys sticker pricing seems designed to deter people from buying HD DVDs. Their discs are stickered at least $4 higher than checkout price. I wouldn't have bought discs there because of this, but I had some gift cards and reward zone money. Babel was marked 29.99 and rang up 24.95 and Lucky # Slevin was marked 24.95 and rang up 20.95. Not sure if this is common on every DVD, Blu-ray Disc, etc. but it struck me as they are trying to deter people from adopting the format with sticker shock. Combo pricing has the same effect, I've seen it first hand.

Honestly, I think you're reading too much into the ad.

I think they are only trying to differ between the two, so people arent mistaken with thier purchases, they wanna minimalize return potentionals. The YMAD was simple diversifing the choice in films across the spectrum avaliable with the formats.

If worse comes to worse, I'm sure CC will have a nice ad before long :P

btw, is this only limited to online or for instore purchases also?

It's because you bought two and got $10 off. That is the deal this week.

Don't forget that according to Best Buy HD DVD is also in stunning 720p compared to 1080p for Blu-ray.

exactly.

After reading this post I was starting to wonder if that's what happened. Their sticker prices are still sky high though.

That is just inexcusable. I can't decide if it would be worse if they did because they're idiots or because they want to slander HD-DVD.

I've been very disappointed with HD-DVD's lack of releases as of late and I think it's going to be tough for them to win, but even so, this kind of misrepresentation is just BS. I would Toshiba would lay into them for this.

It's probably because they really are supposed to be priced lower, but they haven't bothered to put new stickers on them yet. I've seen it before with DVDs that haven't been updated. Do you ever notice how sometimes you see two or three stickers stacked on a case? They should be putting new stickers on when the prices are changed.

There is that deal this week, but since you saved about $9 instead of $10, I don't think that's the reason for each one to ring up lower. They should ring up and show on the receipt for the correct price, then the discount is subtracted from the total (think about it: what if you only bought one?).

Edit: nevermind, I was drunk when I read that the first time.

It upsets me to think that Best Buy and its Canadian counterpart, Future Shop, are the only places I can buy HD-DVDs and Blu-ray Discs, here in Canada. I've found one other place, but it was a specialty DVD store in Toronto. I'm not driving an hour to buy these things, but I hate overpaying at Best Buy/FS. Plus, it takes them an assload of time to get anything in (ie. Brokeback Mountain on HD-DVD was about 3 weeks late.)

I don't you--either is possible. I used to work in advertising & I have a friend in BB advertising. It all depends on both the knowledge & the direction of the higher-up directing the ad. One could be bold & one not just to differentiate, OR to make one jump out more (which it seems to do). Blu-Ray is mentioned first every time and in front and in bold, so we'll see what they do next time...

Why don't you order online?

"Hey, Corporate just said to make sure Blu-Ray stands out. Make it sure it does on the new weekly."
"Blu-what?"
"Blu-Ray. The new DVD format."
"Oh yeah, ok. No problem, Steve."

That's probably about it. No moustache twirling.

Walmarts in Canada carry them too, but the selection isn't as good as FS or BB.

Nobody's commented about the "Mix and match Blu-Ray and HD-DVD"? Makes it sound like they will all play on the same player, when right now there is only one that can play both of them!

The better Blu-Ray sounds maybe they sell more PS3's. The fact that HD-DVDs are promoted at 720p instead of 1080i/720p is just an obvious Blu-Ray push. Alittle Sony under the table action with BB.

i found this thread amusing.
and your post? what a joke.
the blu-ray hate is so sad. OH NO blu-ray is BOLDED!!!! best buy favors blu-ray! down with best buy! i'm gonna go cry in the corner now!

LOL

no way man. it's totally sony paying best buy to push blu-ray in all of our faces. can't you see it? i can see it so clearly.

LOL