David Stone
Stunt Coordinator
- Joined
- Jan 6, 2002
- Messages
- 112
I picked up my OAR DVD of "Harry Potter" this morning and noticed a very disturbing thing.
The first stop was CompUSA, where the manager-on-duty defended his lack of OAR versions by informing me he received 70 full-screen copies, but only 7 (seven!) OAR ones for today's advertised sale.
Next stop was Target, which had set up a large end-of-isle display complete with artwork header. From top to bottom, there were 3 shelves of full-screen VHS tapes , 3 shelves of full-screen DVD's and one single row of OAR DVD's at the bottom.
Wal-Mart was the last stop, which had a large free-standing floor display that appeared to have come from the distributor. The display was four-sided, with each side divided down the middle to display both VHS tapes and DVD's. Similar to Target, all the VHS tapes were full-screen, as were the top three of the four rows of DVD's. Only the half-row at the bottom of each side stocked OAR DVD's.
When I got home, I checked online and there doesn't even appear to be a wide-screen version available on VHS tape (as with other popular films).
Did each of these retailers happen to decide to on their own to stock so much full-screen product (and so little OAR), or did the Warner Home Video distributors suggest it to the wholesale buyers?
Getting my films in OAR is one of the main reasons I switched to Laserdisc and, in turn, DVD (and I still refuse to purchase "Space Jam" until a proper OAR is released), so why is WHV taking a step back and trying to push full-screen on the public now?
(Besides the obvious greed-motivated reason that today's full-screen customer will get be coming back and purchase the same film a second time to get OAR when HDTV becomes more popular.)
Or did I answer my own question?
The first stop was CompUSA, where the manager-on-duty defended his lack of OAR versions by informing me he received 70 full-screen copies, but only 7 (seven!) OAR ones for today's advertised sale.
Next stop was Target, which had set up a large end-of-isle display complete with artwork header. From top to bottom, there were 3 shelves of full-screen VHS tapes , 3 shelves of full-screen DVD's and one single row of OAR DVD's at the bottom.
Wal-Mart was the last stop, which had a large free-standing floor display that appeared to have come from the distributor. The display was four-sided, with each side divided down the middle to display both VHS tapes and DVD's. Similar to Target, all the VHS tapes were full-screen, as were the top three of the four rows of DVD's. Only the half-row at the bottom of each side stocked OAR DVD's.
When I got home, I checked online and there doesn't even appear to be a wide-screen version available on VHS tape (as with other popular films).
Did each of these retailers happen to decide to on their own to stock so much full-screen product (and so little OAR), or did the Warner Home Video distributors suggest it to the wholesale buyers?
Getting my films in OAR is one of the main reasons I switched to Laserdisc and, in turn, DVD (and I still refuse to purchase "Space Jam" until a proper OAR is released), so why is WHV taking a step back and trying to push full-screen on the public now?
(Besides the obvious greed-motivated reason that today's full-screen customer will get be coming back and purchase the same film a second time to get OAR when HDTV becomes more popular.)
Or did I answer my own question?