The cost of Blu ray discs - a question for Clare or Andrew

[admin_exported]

We all know that Blu ray Discs are too expensive. My local Zavvi was selling some for £27 (with a 25% discount at the end, but you get the picture) and a lot of discs seem VERY expensive on the shelf. This is one of the reasons why the format is not taking off in the way it could/should. Players are falling in price and reaching the famed 'Permission to Buy Threshold' (the point at which you don't have to ask your wife/girlfriend or "partner" if it's OK). For DVD that was £100 and marked the point at which both players and discs began to fly out of the stores.
So, here's my question. Warners are now dropping their SRP in the US. Will they do it here? Do any of the WHF team know?

QUOTE:
For the first time, Warner Home Video will permanently discount 16 of their Blu-ray titles by 43% to a new SRP of $16.99. With retailers typically discounting off SRP by as much as 40%, you can expect to be able to grab these titles for $10-12). The entire list of titles, which will be repriced on April 7th, has not been fully detailed, but what we do know we have listed below:
Scooby-Doo: The Movie
Battle of the Bulge
Body Heat
Eyes Wide Shut: Special Edition
Lethal Weapon
The Omega Man

 

[Anonymous]

You can get some good deals on the net, the most you'll have to pay for a new release is around £17.99 and amazon.co.uk have Blu-ray discs starting from £8.98.

 

[Andy Clough]

As with all new technologies/software, I suspect prices will come down over time. But the studios won't want to throw away their profit margins on a new format too quickly.

 

[Andrew Everard]

...But then the list price of most first release DVDs is £16-£20 - it's just that competition for sales between online, supermarkets and the like is so great that prices are slashed.

Maybe when Blu-ray starts to account for a more significant proportion of the market - at the moment it's just about equalling VHS movie sales in the UK - the competition will increase.

And of course as movies fall into 'back catalogue' rather than 'new release', I'm sure the studios will discount them on BD, just as they do on DVD, to squeeze every penny out of their inventory through 'oh well, it's only a fiver, I'll give it a go' sales.

 

[Sliced Bread]

Casca:
QUOTE:
For the first time, Warner Home Video will permanently discount 16 of their Blu-ray titles by 43% to a new SRP of $16.99. With retailers typically discounting off SRP by as much as 40%, you can expect to be able to grab these titles for $10-12). The entire list of titles, which will be repriced on April 7th, has not been fully detailed, but what we do know we have listed below:
Scooby-Doo: The Movie
Battle of the Bulge
Body Heat
Eyes Wide Shut: Special Edition
Lethal Weapon
The Omega Man
So no good films then

 

[Torres09]

I dont think i would/have ever paid £20 for a BluRay. bricks and mortar will alwats be overpriced due to their overheads etc, etc

I scour t'internet for most of my BluRays.........recently ordered Quantum of Solace from CD WOW got it for ?18, got DieHard Quadrilogy for ?32 (see Hot Deals on Forums), etc, etc sometimes i guess its right time right place, but generally i think there coming down fairly sharpish.........

 

[pioneer7]

blimey thats a name i have not heard in a long time CD-WOW

 

[Frank Harvey]

It's funny how people's values drop over time, especially when they've been spoilt with mega cheap DVD's. What many people forget is that we were all buying 'fantastic quality' DVD's for £19.99 10 years ago, It took a good 5 years for these to drop below £15, and yet BD has achieved this in 2.

 

[Anonymous]

FrankHarveyHiFi:It's funny how people's values drop over time, especially when they've been spoilt with mega cheap DVD's. What many people forget is that we were all buying 'fantastic quality' DVD's for £19.99 10 years ago, It took a good 5 years for these to drop below £15, and yet BD has achieved this in 2.

Entertainment mega-companies, studios and retailers know very well that they can't just charge any price they want and that for most people £20 or £19.99 is the upper limit for pre-recorded media. When people moved on from VHS tapes to DVD's the benefits were easy to see which is why the prices took longer to come down big time (to less than £1 sometimes for a DVD). Today, there is a huge installed base of DVD players and many millions of DVDs inside global households and for many the advantage of moving up to blu-ray is not that clear-cut. If the people in the business of making and selling BD's want to start shifting volume, pricing HAS to come down to a realistic level. For me that's under a tenner a film. It's already happening but only at the "big boys" (Amazon, Play, Tesco Direct, etc.). Even HMV want to charge stupid money for a blu-ray version. Hopefully by next year prices will have come down even further, and the back catalogue will have increased too.

 

[Anonymous]

FrankHarveyHiFi:It's funny how people's values drop over time, especially when they've been spoilt with mega cheap DVD's. What many people forget is that we were all buying 'fantastic quality' DVD's for £19.99 10 years ago, It took a good 5 years for these to drop below £15, and yet BD has achieved this in 2.

You're right there. I was buying LaserDiscs 10 years ago for upto £40 each and now I'm resenting paying £18 for a BD. It's also amazing how quickly the DVD prices drop after a few months of release. 6 months after release you can pick up a blockbuster for half the price of what it was.... not seeing that for blu ray though, yet.

I think we tend to forget how cheap things are these days compared to 10-15 years ago, whether it's the latest piece of kit or DVD's, BD's or CD's.

 

[Gerrardasnails]

Andrew Everard:
Maybe when Blu-ray starts to account for a more significant proportion of the market - at the moment it's just about equalling VHS movie sales in the UK - the competition will increase.

That is an amazing stat. I didn't even know you could still buy VHS!!! Do they still stock them in Blockbuster??!

 

[Frank Harvey]

Thank you nibbo.

Compared to DVD prices, I personally feel that a good BD disc is worth £10-15, If it's not, then the film wasn't worth owning in the first place.

 

[Torres09]

Gerrardasnails:Andrew Everard:

Maybe when Blu-ray starts to account for a more significant proportion of the market - at the moment it's just about equalling VHS movie sales in the UK - the competition will increase.

That is an amazing stat. I didn't even know you could still buy VHS!!! Do they still stock them in Blockbuster??!

Indeed they do Gerrardasnails, there down the back beside the Cassette Tapes

 

[Tonya]

Just for comparison value, here in Norway our local Dixons (Elkj›p) have the following price points for Blu Ray discs :

Quantum of Solace (out 25.03) £15
007 box sets 3 and 4 (out 25.03) £40 each

Most new releases come in at around twenty of your Earth Pounds, while back catalogue stuff such as Pulp fiction, Black Hawk Down, Hairspray, Sex & The City, Shoot 'em up, et al, can be had for £10 each.

By the way, here's a little tip : Quantum of Solace is included in the 007 Blu Ray set 4, together with Licence to kill and MWTGG.
For the Bond fanatics, the 3rd box set contains TWINE, Goldfinger and Moonraker.

If you haven't experienced the Lowery Digital Remasters before, then go out and get them, the transfers are breathtakingly good.
Oh well, back to the snow shovelling . . . .

 

[Frank Harvey]

There's a new film about to be released about that - Dead Formats Society.

 

[Gerrardasnails]

FrankHarveyHiFi:There's a new film about to be released about that - Dead Formats Society.

Stick to selling hifi Frank!

 

[Tonya]

QUOTE : "There's a new film about to be released about that - Dead Formats Society.
Frank Harvey Hi-Fi Ltd"

Now that WAS funny, Frank!
I think I have a shot at being the President of that particular society!
I still have all my Laserdiscs, a Sony ELCassette (remember them?) a couple of JVC VHD players and a quadraphonic 8-Track system. Still sounds great when played through my DBX Boom Box, a cool device that "listens" to the bass line in any audio source and synthesizes it an octave lower. Dead formats indeed. They still work though!

The Pioneer LD player still cranks out an amazing picture without one single compression artifact (I think Goldeneye was the last disc I bought) and the gadget I still use is the Philips DCC home deck. The idea of playing back an old cassette tape and extracting every last bit of information by using the optical digital out is brilliant.

Oh dear, the men in white coats are knocking on my door, better dash now . . . .

 

[Frank Harvey]

 

[Anonymous]

BDs from £8.98 at amazon:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Blu-ray-DVD/s/qid=1237287326/ref=sr_pg_1?ie=UTF8&rs=283926&rh=n%3A283926%2Cp%5F74%3A000-1000%2Cp%5Fn%5Fbinding%5Fbrowse-bin%3A383380011&page=1