BJacks

I would assume if they're able to transfer inventory to other locations or if they have a deal with a liquidator who'll assume the total inventory, then they shut down immediately. If those deals aren't in place then they rely on parsing out the stock over X amount of weeks, hence a long closing sale.

dhmac

Unlike Blockbuster, Hollywood Video never claimed I didn't return a movie and owed late charges on a movie that I had actually dropped in their dropbox on-time a week earlier. (I then stood there and argued with the guy until he removed that mistake from their computer.)

Unlike Blockbuster, Hollywood Video never claimed that a rental debit card for the store had expired even though no expiration date was printed anywhere on the card.

So basically, unlike Blockbuster, Hollywood Video is a good company.

jpb07

They've now filed for bankruptcy and are closing quite a few stores.

^MuYa^

If you go to http://www.hollywoodvideo.com/storelocator.aspx and search for stores in your area it will show you which ones are having a closing sale.

jpb07

I just called one of the soon-to-be closed stores and you'd have to be an idiot to buy anything there now.

New Releases are not on sale for at least a couple of weeks.
Catalog DVDS are $10 a piece.
Old Blu-Rays are $15 a piece.

EdTheRipper

I'm amazed that the store in my city is still open. Over the past few years we've lost another Hollywood location, a Blockbuster and an FYE. We've quickly become one of those cities that has pretty much just a Wal-Mart.

Quatermass

Yep, the one near me is closing. I'm surprised it took this long - it has been pretty dead since the Wal-Mart next to them moved to a bigger location. I was going to stop by there today anyway because I got an e-mail saying they had $1 catalog rentals to compete with redbox. I can't honestly say I'll miss them.

Edit: Just got back. All Rentals (including Blu-ray) are $1/night. "New" releases can be bought for $4.99, catalog titles for $3.99. Used Blu-ray 12.99 (very limited selection). Their new releases were about 3-12 months old. It doesn't look like they have gotten any new stuff to rent since November or so. Still, I rented a couple of catalog titles for $1 that Redbox will probably never have. I'll be going there much more often until they shut the doors. It was busier than I've seen it in a while too.

Zbu

The only unfortunate thing is that they didn't see the writing on the wall until it was too late, or didn't pursue a relationship with Netflix, or didn't start making the change over to a retail establishment to compete with Best Buy. Or ever solve the rationale for having multiple stores in various areas that diluted the brand.

Not bad people, but the management still doomed them to death.

Alan Smithee

Odd that the stores slated to close are still renting out stuff- usually everything gets put on sale as soon as the closing announcement goes out. Will they still charge you for not returning stuff?

I don't hate Hollywood Video as much as Blockbuster, but when they came into my area I already had a laserdisc player, and they carried only VHS so I figured they were pretty much behind the times. And they STILL never had any porn.

Lone Wolf

I just got back from my local Movie Gallery. They'll be open for about 8 more weeks. Most of the prices ranged from $3.99 to 10.99. There was some newer stuff like District 9 and Transformers 2 for $7.99. Blurays were around $15. I wanted to pick up some tv shows but they were all separated into single discs for $10 a piece so it wasn't worth it.

Troy Stiffler

Awe. One of my first jobs was at Hollywood Video. And I noticed the other day that it closed. Makes me feel like an old man.

That job taught me the meaning of shithead customers. If you ever want to be in a position where you're shat-on by week-long bottled-up suburbanite agression, because you don't have End of Days in stock (or they brought it back a day late and have to pay a late fee), work at a video store. It's like that one week of a meaningless existence just boils down to that one movie being out of stock.

I had a $30 late charge for "The Straight Story" from back when I worked there. After I quit, it was a little joke that I had that charge on there for several years. At least my debt has been relinquished.

Living Deadpan

Same here, except my worst customer "beating" occurred because we were out of The Sixth Sense the Saturday after it was released on video (a dickhead on the phone *insisted* I search for in-stock copies on the computer when it was plain fact the shelves were empty and no arrivals from the drop box I checked every 3 minutes).

Another Sixth Sense issue, while not shithead & just "petty annoyance", was that every other customer made some lame joke about "six cents" or "the sixth cent" because back then new releases after tax totaled to $4.06. But I'll take weekday punners over volatile weekend idiots.

...and they only rent it because everyone else is, few people give a shit about the actual movie. Unless the new release happens to be a more "artsy" wide-release or Oscar-winner, in which case they care enough to say "what a piece of crap" as they angrily return it. I recall this happening most with American Beauty & Magnolia; I was told that before I worked there Fargo got lots of angry returns.

Troy Stiffler

Sounds like we worked there at about the same time. I worked at the 48th/Ray one.

When I started working at the movie theater, I was told that Magnolia walk-outs were more frequent than anything else.

I was going to the Ray/Rural location for the past year or so. But I only buy (no renting). I was kind of bummed that they closed. They were reliable for picking up newer used releases.

SethDLH

All the stores by me closed up a while back, the closest one did so in the middle of the night with no mention to its employees.

I remember a few years back I really needed some extra income so I applied to the store where the manager informed me she was new and performing a "complete team member overhaul because everyone there was lazy and stupid"... it took her over a month to get back to me about the job... no wonder they're shutting down stores like crazy.

calhoun07

Clearly the employees weren't "lazy and stupid." They knew exactly what they were doing...raiding a sinking ship right before it went under.

Al_Tahoe

Well... to be fair... American Beauty was a piece of crap.

On the other hand, anyone that didn't like Fargo should be severely beaten.