I was just curious. If a DVD is set for release on any given day (lets say Nov 26 - tomorrow), when did the DVD actually get to the store. I’m (fairly) certain it doesn’t arrive the day of the release.
Any ideas?
Zev Steinhardt
Generally we would get them a week before. I used to manage a video store. We would get Tuesday’s new releases on the Thursday prior. That way we could watch them over the weekend before anyone else got to see them, for purposes of being able to recommend them to customers. Great system, really.
Music and DVD almost always have a “street date” or official date when store may begin selling it. The street date is always a tuesday (don’t ask me why). Officially the product should arrive in stores the wednesday before the tuesday street date. I have heard of product arriving as late as monday night for tuesday onsale. You’d be amazed how seat of the pants the music industry is sometimes.
For books the lead time is much larger, often they have the books a few weeks in advance. Also, not every book has an official on sale date (called a “laydown date” on the book side)
There are fines and other penalties for sellers who break street dates. Competing stores (within a mall say) tend to turn each other in if they see the other breaking street.
In case you’re wondering of my qualifications, I work for a major international Book, Music and DVD seller.
I love questions I’m actually qualified to answer! I’m not actually talking out my butt this time! <novelty>
Hello Again, in response to why the release date is always a tuesday, I was always told that it allowed for the early turn-over before the busy weekends, especially important in the rental industry. If your rental period is two days, and your release dates were on a friday, all your copies would be gone by friday afternoon, and would be out all weekend. You’d have some mighty angry customers (Usually do anyways, though) The tuesday release allows for the rental periods between your copies to become as staggered as possible by friday. Or at least that’s the idea.
Also,
>I have heard of product arriving as late as monday night for tuesday onsale.
This is true. It all depends on your distributor and package delivery service. I remember many a monday night spent prepping and shelving the next day’s new releases – not fun, especially if you’re doing inventory as well!
Okay, I have a question that may sound a bit silly. Has the lagtime between the “recieved” date and the street date shortened a bit due to the internet, and also possibly if an item is really hot? I can certainly see in the case of a new Harry Potter book or something of the like, the temptation to go a bit earlier than the street date would be enormous, seeing how much of an advantage it would give you. I also wonder if media companies are more inclined to release things closer to the wire, so the lag time between something being available on MP3 and in stores shortens.
Thank you for your responses!
XJETGIRL – you’re looking at it from a rental environment. From a retail environment the weekend availability is irrelevant – the store should theoretically have enough stock to last more than 1 or two days (if not, the buyer’s in trouble!) No doubt tuesday onsale does work well for the rental industry, but I’m not sure that’s where or why it began (after all music also has tuesday street dates, and you don’t rent CDs).
Not to mention (yeesh, I’m on a role) that the onsale date for rental establishments is different – earlier – from the onsale date for retail consumers. Otherwise they wouldn’t be able to get video stores to cough up $60-$90 per video while consumers pay $17-$30.
OK, thanks.
The upshot of all this is that I work for a company that sells DVDs (among other things). I have been patiently waiting for Lilo & Stitch to come out. The street date is Dec 3, but, being impatient, I wanted to know how soon I could bug the store manager into selling me a copy. I don’t know if they will, but I certainly didn’t want to do it before the darn thing even came in.
Zev Steinhardt
[b[netbrian** in short, no. There are penalties in place to prevent stores from breaking street dates (obviously there is a strong temptation to do just that).
The problem is, if they ship too late, there is chance the product won’t make it onto the floor. Or, a larger risk of some seriously pissed off retailers bitching and moaning to sales reps because they had to pay overtime to get the product on the sales floor (because if a title is big enough, it WILL get out there).
Of course stores would like to have as little product in the store room, and as much on the shelves as is humanly possible. You So, stores would, in general prefer to receive product as close to street as they can… without it being too close to deal with in a regularly scheduled fashion.
Zev, Try the Wed 27th or Friday 29th. But he might refuse to do it, just because he could get in trouble for selling you a copy. Do you know him personally? If not, I’d expect him to say no.
I know the managers by sight and they would recognize me. If they say no, it’s not the end of the world… I’ll just have to wait until next Tuesday like everyone else in the world. If that’s my biggest problem in life, I’ll be thrilled.
Zev Steinhardt
Hello Again,
>XJETGIRL – you’re looking at it from a rental environment.
Yeah, sorry. OP didn’t specify, so of course my brain translated it to rental item.
Geez I worked there too long!
Scott (who used to work at Blockbuster) says:
They usually arrive Wednesday or Thursday, but you’ll never get a Disney or Lucasfilm movie before the street date. They’re really obsessive about that.
I’ll second LaurAnge. Your chances of getting a Disney release before the street date are pretty much nil.
My husband is “in the industry” to the point that we got the extended Fellowship of the Rings about six weeks before its release date - prerelease. Harry Potter about three weeks before. All sorts of junk stuff months and months before. But NEVER any Disney major releases as prereleases – or even promos after the release. (Oh, OK, we can get Little Mermaid II as a promo, but not the good stuff).
God I miss screeners! I too, used to be an employee of the Blue & Yellow…used to get screener tapes about 3-4 months in advance. I still have a huge collection. Need to find some way to get rid of them…can’t sell the dang things, and can’t give away half of them. Heh.