Alan Smithee

The last Target survey I took, I mentioned that I was disappointed in their reduced movie selection and that I'd made a lot of impulse buys there over the years. Looking through them was a big reason why I went there to pick up essentials like cat food and stuff, and that I'd probably go elsewhere for those in the future if no stores had those things to look through.

morriscroy

Heh.

McKinsey (or bcg) taking over and destroying BestBuy, target, etc ... ? ! ? !


EDIT: It appears Best Buy's CEO over 2012 to 2019/2020 was once a McKinseyite when he was younger.

https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/pr...x?facId=520131

No big surprise a former McKinseyite would bring in McKinsey to do some consulting.

morriscroy

The question is how much of that dollar store stuff is liquidated inventory which has already written off for tax purposes?

If it's written off, then the movie company is likely not seeing any revenue from it.

morriscroy

They're probably not worried too much if there's new customer(s) replacing every previous customer who vows to never shop there again.

morriscroy

Heh.

Even former aspiring american presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg was assigned to the Best Buy contract when he was working at McKinsey in the mid-late 2000s.

https://www.latimes.com/politics/sto...y-client-names

Gizmo

Harsh. I’m sure Target has plans for when the Boomers stop shopping there.

Alan Smithee

Blinged-out cell phone cases?

morriscroy

Star Wars toy figures and otc viagra pills.

asianxcore

Agreed. With Target, for every person who swears them off, a ton take their place.

They made $93 billion dollars last year during a global pandemic. I don't think they are worried about their downsized media sections.

milo bloom

Yeah, Target is always busy. There’s tons of locations around here and they are never at a loss for customers but when I check the DVD section I’m usually the only one.

asianxcore

Yup! Even the worst Targets in various areas I've been to are rarely at a loss for customers & foot traffic.

While it's a bummer that B&M stores that used to carry a lot of Physical Media are downsizing, it's easy for some individuals to forget that times are (always) changing. The Best Buy store that I purchased the Guinea Pig Box Set (DVD) from back in 2005 isn't the same store, neither does it exist in the same world technology-wise.

Currently, my concern isn't with faceless corporations who are no longer catering to physical media buyers but how hard the transition to streaming & downloading has been for smaller or medium-sized business that focus on selling physical media.

Here in Northern California, there aren't many places left to even get used BD & DVDs in the quantity of places like Rasputin Music, Half Price Books or Amoeba Music (San Francisco).

Josh-da-man

My experience at Target is the complete opposite.

The ones near me are usually pretty dead. It's never hard to find a good parking spot, and the aisles are mostly devoid of people, save a handful of suburban hausfraus languidly pushing around nearly empty carts. And I never have to wait in line to check out. They're packed on Black Friday/Thanksgiving Night, though.

The city/urban Walmarts are always a fucking madhouse, though. It's like bumper cars in the parking lot, and a crowded refugee camp on the inside. The Walmarts out in the sticks and 'burbs are cleaner and much more manageable, though.

PhantomStranger

Most areas I visit, the Walmarts are always more crowded than the Targets. Some of that is by design, each chain goes after different market segments. I do think in the long run, Target gets squeezed between Amazon and Walmart.

Gizmo

My Best Buy reduced BDs down to maybe 100 unique titles (when they has maybe 600-800 before). They were all lining a wall back by the video games. It’s pretty much the hottest releases and some evergreen stuff like Star Wars and Disney

BuckNaked2k

Coral

Wow... dropped considerably even when compared to last years low pandemic numbers.

I think we're starting to see the streaming effect take over for those stragglers who previously wouldn't jump aboard.
Nothing's gonna stop this train now.

Gizmo

When Best Buy and other retailers are reducing stock significantly...yeah, its gonna keep shrinking.

Does anyone really think there will be another physical disc format after 4k BD?

Adam Tyner

Not that I’m expecting some dazzling meteoric resurgence, but I do think there will be at least a modest rebound once things get a little more back to normal. When titles like Raya are streaming on Disney+ for “free” almost concurrently with a home video release and, say, Tom and Jerry was already “free” on HBO Max, there’s less of an incentive to shell out $30 to buy a copy. (Those aren’t random examples; they’re the top-charting titles for the past 3 weeks.)

Blu-ray and UHD BD are driven by new releases, and those are in incredibly short supply. So few new titles are coming out that even something like the DTV animated movie Justice Society: World War II can literally top the charts.

Did anyone really think that even pre-pandemic? The only people I’ve seen say anything about, say, an 8K format are the ones complaining why they shouldn’t bother with UHD BD.

Coral

Super Ultra Extreme 8K Blu-Ray.

When people take a look at this, physical disc sales will skyrocket!

Josh-da-man

I think discs have been hit with a double-whammy with the pandemic. One, people were staying at home and streaming stuff from Netflix, Prime, Hulu, and whatever else. Two, the lack of theatrical releases for a year has meant no more new releases on the shelves for a year, and that could break the habit of buying discs for a lot of people.

Alan Smithee

Question is will we ever need a format beyond 4K Blu-Ray?

lwhy?

I think there is a supply chain problem too. If you watch Coolduder's videos on Youtube, he goes around to Target, Walmart, and Best Buy on Tuesdays to look at the new releases. He sometimes goes to five different Walmarts and two or three different Targets and the new releases aren't out. Sometimes he can't find the new releases for a couple weeks or never at all.

morriscroy

Certainly.

Holodecks running holo-novels/movies on holographic data cubes.

BuckNaked2k

How 'bout that Bob Odenkirk movie? That should move the arrows a little once it streets...

WeeBey

With theatrical releases returning to normal now, I expect to see a lot of year on year growth next year before sales go red again in 2023. But, man, we've seen basically two solid years of severe declines in disc media sales. It's unlikely we'll see a full recovery to the pre-pandemic trend line.

It's just bad luck that the pandemic happened just when everyone was ready to launch their streaming service. No doubt people would have been buying more DVDs and BDs if all this happened 3 or 4 years ago when it was pretty much Netflix or bust.