Amazon, Best Buy unveil Cyber Monday promotions
Warner, Barnes & Noble also cut prices on DVDs today
By Danny King -- Video Business, 12/1/2008
DEC. 1 | Amazon.com, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble and Warner Home Video are among companies that unleashed special Internet promotions on Blu-ray Disc players and DVDs late last week that will extend through today in an effort to lure bargain-minded shoppers during the early part of the holiday season.
Amazon e-mailed customers details of discounts on about three-dozen electronics items starting on Nov. 28, or Black Friday. Included in the Amazon promotion, which runs through today, is Samsung's BD-P1500 player, whose price was cut $100 to $199.
Best Buy listed reduced prices for yesterday and today on about a dozen flat-screen TVs and on Blu-ray players made by Panasonic and LG Electronics, whose prices were each cut $70 to $229 and $279, respectively. The largest U.S. electronics retailer also discounted prices for today on about 20 Blu-ray titles, including Paramount Home Entertainment's Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and the Godfather series.
Retailers are hoping that such promotions will increase Internet spending for today, referred to as Cyber Monday, and for the next few weeks by enough of an amount to offset the online-spending decline for most of last month. Online spending on retail goods, excluding travel, for the 28 days ended Nov. 28 declined 4% from a year earlier to $10.41 billion, ComScore said in a report released yesterday.
Year-to-year increases in Cyber Monday online spending has nearly mirrored that of the entire holiday season, said ComScore, which reported that last year's Cyber Monday Internet spending surged 21% from a year earlier and shoppers spent 19% more online during last year’s holiday season than 2006’s frame.
About 85 million people will shop online today, up 18% from last year, the National Retail Federation said in a separate report today.
Warner jumped into the DVD discount fray, e-mailing customers Friday about a promotion in which prices of about 50 DVD titles, including the Austin Powers movies, The Fugitive and Shawshank Redemption, were cut.
Barnes & Noble, the largest U.S. bookseller, unveiled a promotion last week in which hundreds of DVDs and Blu-ray discs were marked down for today by as much as 70%.
Additionally, New York-based distributor Film Movement on Nov. 28 e-mailed customers a promotion offering three-, six- and 12-month DVD-of-the-month gift subscriptions at a 20% discount. This morning, Film Movement sent out e-mails extending the same offer through today.
