The Limits of Redbox

by

Zack Mandell

When Redbox first hit the scene it was a revolution. The price was unbeatable, a single dollar for a one day rental of a newly released movie. This was several dollars cheaper than a standard video rental at the time and so it was quite popular. As the concept grew legs and became mainstream, its limitations began to show. And while Redbox is undoubtedly still a good deal and a great way to rent movies, there are some downsides that have crept up along the way. So read on to learn the limits of Redbox.

The Limited Selection The first major downside to this revolutionary way to rent a movie is the limited selection. Those bright red metal kiosks can only hold so many titles, so the back catalog suffers from it. Of course if you only want to watch big blockbusters that have recently been released on DVD, you will have no trouble finding what you are looking for. But if you like to watch foreign films or small studio releases, you will have a harder time finding these. Those who like things that are off the beaten path or not in the mainstream will be disappointed in this lowest common denominator fare. The Thirty Day Wait When Redbox first came on the scene, it had new releases the day they hit the shelves in conventional rental stores. This was a great deal and the customers loved it. Of course the movie studios began to take notice and saw that they were not making as much money as they could off of Redbox. So they decided to impose a 28 day delay on Redbox releases, in order to milk as much money from rental stores and DVD purchases as possible. This devalued the benefit of the new way of renting movies substantially. The Nerfed Discs Not satisfied with making customers wait and additional month before using a rental kiosk, the movie studios took it one step further and began to create rental disc specifically for Redbox, for the purpose of removing key features and extras. This was done in an attempt to make an incentive to buy the DVD version to get all the ‘extras’ that should have been included anyway. In some cases, these dumbed down discs even removed features for the disabled such as closed captioning. This further devalued the kiosk renting concept. Other Limits Not all limits of this new idea are the result of anti-consumer moves by the movie studios like the ones above. One of the reasons that they can charge so much is that they do not have to pay for rental space, employees, and utilities such as air conditioning. Of course this means that instead of browsing at your leisure in a heated building, you have to stand outside in the freezing rain while you choose a movie, and those behind you will likely be hostile towards those who like to spend a bit of time browsing. The lack of employees also means that there is no one around to guide your purchases either. This means that you have to rely on movie reviews in order to know if you will like Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter before you rent it.

ZacK Mandell is a freelance writer for

movieroomreviews.com

.

Article Source:

The Limits of Redbox