xoshagsox

Wondering if blockbuster is going to have their $8 trade in again. I have some dvd that I would like to trade in.

marty888

I seriously doubt that they EVER will do that again - there is no way it helped their bottom line. Since they are most likely on less solid financial ground than when they ran this promotion, don't hold your breath.

MovieExchange

Not gonna happen. As I've said in other threads that ask this question, the ones that do take trade-ins are getting more than enough to stock their store and the ones that don't take trades. The purpose of the $8 trade-in was to build the opening stock and to get attention for their new previously viewed section.

A lot of locations took a massive loss not only in getting $5.50 Wal-Mart junk titles but also from taking in the crap $1 titles in cardboard sleeves. One person went around and bought every $1 title he could and made about $800 from our local BBV before an employee that was a DVD collector caught on and put a stop to it. Imagine that happening at multiple stores with multiple people.

calhoun07

They just need to tighten their policies. If the UPC code doesn't scan, don't take the friggin thing. Geez, don't these BBV employees have back bone? Over in the bargains thread, we have BBV employees refusing a sale to a customer who legitimately got a DVD box set for 26.99 but here we have an example of where they just let $800.00 walk out the door for something that they didn't even have to do in the first place. And assume for a minute that those UPC codes scanned, so what then? Somebody who enters in the buy back quantities in the computer would have to manually set those titles to ZERO buy back quantities. But that would take research and time, something BBV isn't too willing to invest these days since they have no extra cash since getting rid of late fees.

MovieExchange

Tightening the policy would require that the decision makers learn something more about DVD's than "let's sell them," and they aren't inclined to do that. I'd lay money that the people that implemented this trade-in program never knew $1 DVD's existed until an employee passed the message up the ladder.

As for the UPC codes, I don't know how BBV set the system up... if they selected specific ones that they had rented, or if they just grabbed some "here's all known DVD UPC codes" database. More likely the latter.

calhoun07

Basically, if the DVD was in their system and entered in at some point, even if not at the location the DVD is being traded in at, the UPC code will be attatched to the appropriate part number for the DVD. Most, if not all, dollar DVDs do not connect with any of their part numbers as BBV has never carried these dollar DVDs. In some instances, the employee will find the title if they do a find search in the computer, but more than likely, it's for a different studio's release, not the dollar DVD release. That's why if something doesn't scan, it should be a red flag. Some people who work there don't think of it, some don't give a crap, and a few will turn the DVDs over right back to the customer and inform them they can't be taken for trade. There is no universal policy, AFAIK.

Would tightening their policy on this require a deep knowlege of all dollar stores and Wal Marts across the nation and their inventory. A simple no scan, no trade rule would suffice.

BigDan

When I traded in some discs during that $8 promotion, the clerk wouldn't take any DVD that didn't scan. A couple surprised me since they were movies they had for rent at that store (and, as far as I know, they weren't $5.50 bin DVDs at that point).

One scanned as something other than it was, though, but she didn't say anything.

Abob Teff

Well, we've been trading for about a month now and we have taken in a whole 6 pieces (4 of which were employee trades for training purposes). What a success!

ShallowHal

I wish, I sold $220 worth and put the card on eBay for 20% off. Same price as selling them all on half, but I didn't have to package and ship them all.