Dec. 27 titles bow with few complaints
Weather holds up shipments for some retailers
By Susanne Ault -- Video Business, 12/30/2008
DEC. 30 | Dec. 27 releases Baghead from Sony Pictures Home Entertainment and Eagle Eye, Ghost Town and The Duchess from Paramount Home Entertainment mostly streeted as planned on Saturday, with only isolated instances of stores putting the titles out for sale early, retailers said.In contrast, a week earlier, Wal-Mart, Best Buy and Target stores broke the Friday, Dec. 19, street date of Anchor Bay Entertainment’s Traitor and put the title on sale Dec. 16, forcing other retailers to scramble to get it out on their own store shelves and angering others who were still waiting for their shipments of the title. Warner Home Video also bumped its released date for The Women to Friday, Dec. 19, from a planned Sunday, Dec. 21, release date, on a few days notice. Paramount initially listed its three titles for Dec. 28 bows, but notified retailers they could street them the day earlier if they wanted.
InMotion Entertainment and Blockbuster franchisee Major Video were among those reporting that a handful of Best Buy outlets in Florida and Missouri jumped the gun, shelving Eagle Eye on Friday, Dec. 26.
But retailers for the most part called the street date violations isolated and forgivable, focusing more on the inconvenience of non-Tuesday bows.
“I think both retailers and customers are so used to titles being released on Tuesdays that it was a little confusing for everyone involved,” said Shannon Nutt, DVDEmpire.com editorial director. “From a mere sales standpoint, however, I don’t think it had a major impact one way or another. DVDEmpire.com and some other online retailers don’t ship on Sundays, so customers got these new releases no earlier than they would have if they had just been released on Tuesday.”
Best Buy and Paramount did not comment by deadline.
John Sanders, Major Video product/operations manager, added, “I think it would be easiest to just go with a set day. That makes it easier for everybody. Employees need to get the product in, get it prepared, and [if it needs to be shelved on an unusual day] that can throw everybody off.”
Although labor-intensive, weekend street dates are proving to be a breeze compared to freak snow storms for some retailers this holiday season. Scarecrow Video in snow-drenched Seattle was still waiting for its shipment of Eagle Eye, Duchess and Ghost Town on Monday, Dec. 29.
“It is all sitting in a UPS truck in their parking lot,” Scarecrow buyer Mark Steiner said. “We are really dealing with some adverse weather.”
