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A Million BD Subscribers for Netflix; Disc Rentals Expected for 20+ More Years
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Posted October 23, 2009 07:04 AM by Juan Calonge
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 Based on data given by Netflix during yesterday's Q3 2009 earnings call, it follows that the rental company is approaching or has passed a million Blu-ray subscribers, in what is twofold growth in less than a year, despite having increased subscription rates for BD twice, in October 2008 and April 2009.
The company didn't give a hard figure for Blu-ray subscribers, but it did say that it had 11.1 million total subscribers as of September 30, and in answer to one of the analysts, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings informed that the percentage of users that are on Blu-ray subscription had "stayed pretty steady for us just under 10%." Simple arithmetic tells us that the number of Blu-ray subscribers must then be very close to a million, give or take a few thousand.
In December 2008, Netflix announced it had hit 500,000 Blu-ray subscribers. By the end of the year, Netflix had 700,000 Blu-ray subscribers (out of 9.4 million total subscribers).
While articles on the demise of discs are published every day, Hastings said he was "struck" by the fact that they expected Netflix's postal expense to be approximately $600 million and growing, as disc shipments increase with no flattening in sight - in 2011 postal expense is expected to be over $700 million.
Netflix has just spent $40 million for rental return machines that can accept the returning DVDs, open them, clean them, inspect them, and prepare them for reshipment. These machines will be installed over the next 18 months, with a view to saving money and improving service quality. Hastings said that this investment makes financial sense "because our DVD shipment volume is still growing and we expect to be renting DVDs until 2030."
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Source: Seeking Alpha |
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fullyalive76
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Oct 23, 2009
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The very retail price of Blu-ray is promoting rental over purchase. So while those numbers look impressive to some it really just shows how many people out there are not willing to spend money on Blu-ray like they did DVD.
At the same time people are selling short streaming. On here all of us know the quality is amazing on Blu-ray but that has never been the point. The point is that most people are happy with what passes for HD streaming video.
Will the quality of streaming video match that of Blu-ray anytime soon? No. Does it matter? No because it's the content, not the quality of it. It's just like video games. There are some beautiful looking games out there but the system winning hands down is not the one with the best graphics but the easiest accessibility without dropping a ton of money. |
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MCWHAMMER
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Oct 23, 2009
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If I can see something I'd been waiting on instantly on HD streaming versus waiting two days for it on Blu-ray, of course I'll stream it. The quality is negligible to the eyes, because you're simply too happy to be able to stream it within seconds to even care. I'm not a pixel counter like most - it gets you nowhere.
I love Blu-ray, but much like DVD, it's too costly to keep purchasing, when I can simply pay a small monthly fee to stream and rent all the Blu-ray and HD films I would ever need to see (personally, I use the Roku Player over HDMI in 1080p).
Netflix rocks for me. |
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JamisonC
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Oct 23, 2009
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He expects "to be renting DVDs until 2030"? That seems far fetched. By 2020 there will probably be a higher-definition option than BDs so I doubt DVDs will still be popular in 2030. I won't be subscribing to Netflix until BD (rental) pricing is more reasonable. |
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Josh
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Oct 23, 2009
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I switched over to Blockbuster once Netflix started charging extra for Blu-ray, and have been extremely pleased with their service. I always had trouble with Netflix getting popular titles for months after release, but never have that issue with Blockbuster. I sent in a disc on Monday, and Tuesday they shipped out Transformers: Revenge of Fallen. Discs that Netflix didn't know existed on Blu-ray are easily found at Blockbuster.
While I'm pleased to see that Netflix is growing, I wish they would drop their ridiculous Blu-ray fees. Every DVD I rent is scratched and skips, while every Blu-ray I rent works perfectly. If they are replacing Blu-rays more, they need to do the same with DVDs and not charge just Blu-ray renters for the cost. |
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mkelley
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Oct 23, 2009
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Yeah, I dropped the BD option as soon as Netflix increased it again. I'm already paying too much for the service.
I may switch to Blockbuster as well -- did it a few years ago because NetFlix was yanking me around as well then with higher costs. Now that BB will stream to my TiVO (like Netflix) it might be time to stop bleeding money out to those bandits. |
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Mr Bluray
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Oct 23, 2009
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@Josh thats odd I usually leave me que open 1 slot and I get the new releases sent out.I got Revenge of the fallen on tuesday.I usually always get all my new releases quick.I pay $17.82 after tax for 2 at a time bluray.At the very least get 2 diffrent movies a week in a 4 week period thats 8.So 17.82/8=$2.22 a movie.Last month I had a total of 12 movies delivered through the month so $17.82/12 =$1.48 a movie not to mention I can stream movies thats not bad at all. |
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Tempest
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Oct 23, 2009
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I gave up long ago on ever getting anything new released from netflix.. it never happens, I have to wait 1-2 months before I can get something new.
I don't pay them for blu ray because I refuse to pay extra for it. I may soon just move to Blockbusters again but the thing that **** me off about blockbusters is when I had some cracked discs, the web site would not let me report them as cracked because the web site thought I wouldn't get the discs until the next day when in fact I had receicved them already. That was beyond stupid so I canceled them and went to netflix.. |
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ibeetle
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Oct 23, 2009
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2030? Blu-ray Disc subscription increasing? But... but... but, physical media is dead. Blu-ray is only a stop gap until digital downloads increase the picture quality to match that of Blu-ray. Blu-ray itself will be dead in two years, three tops. Netflix streaming through my XBox will put Sony and their loser format out of business... as soon as my 5th XBox comes back from being repaired for the 10th time. |
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Frozenpinky
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Oct 23, 2009
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I promise you all one thing: Netflix will not be renting DVD's in 2030. The reason; CD is already dying, if not 70% dead at this point in 2009. DVD will follow suit by 2015. Blu-ray will be around until 2020. At that time we'll better be able to see if physical media will last. |
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HDDVD(RIP)
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Oct 23, 2009
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Streaming is to damn lazy. Go outside, buy/rent the movie, take it out of the case, put it in your bluray and go. Shit we still have vinyl which is way better than any CD or download. You actually get to hold it in your hands. But damn nerds have to downlaod itunes, and get their flicks and tunes that way, which makes me sad inside.... |
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phatrat1982
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Oct 23, 2009
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Physical Media and Downloading will always co-exist there never will come a day when one completely wipes out the other. The earths population continues to increase and with it more and more people with different tastes get born into this world who have different views. Some old fashioned, others cutting edge. Either way both options have their ups and downs.
Personally I love Blu Ray, and downloads the same. I am all about quality for the most part but sometimes I just can't find the movie I want on Blu Ray or if it's not out yet I have to settle for a lower quality anyways and that only leaves the digital copy or tracking down a DVD which I rarely do.
As for Records being better than CD, uh that is far-fetched my friend. Records do offer a good depth of audio quality very good deep bass and rich sound to be sure, but the crackling is awful. CD provide the same quality and richness as a record but you don't have the crackle.
CD's aren't going anywhere either and neither is DVD but Blu Ray which is still growing is growing far slower than CD or DVD did in their day so it's future is not as certain as some hopefuls think. |
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Sprigg Diggler
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Oct 23, 2009
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Does this mean they'll fix the problem with cracked blu ray discs showing up at my house? I just sent back Observe & Report because it was cracked after waiting 2 weeks to finally get it.
I received a cracked copy of Mission Impossible and sent it back with a post it on the disc sleeve labeled "Cracked Disc" along with a "Cracked Disc Inside" note on the return envelope to Netflix. 3 days later I received a new envelope from Netflix and when I pulled out the sleeve, I received ANOTHER cracked copy of Mission Impossible. The best part was that my "Cracked Disc" post it was still on the sleeve! |
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Frozenpinky
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Oct 24, 2009
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Phatrat, the only thing you typed that was correct was that CD can provide the same richness and quality as a record.
But everything else you typed is wrong.
Your comment about CD's is wrong; I worked at a CD plant for 20 years. We went from 40 orders a day to 30 to 20 to five orders a day. Now they're almost out of business and 26 employees got laid off in the last 10 months. CD's are DEFINITELY not here to stay. In Graphics Arts class in college, they no longer teach how to design CD artwork because "Nobody has bought a CD in the last five years".
Your comment about DVD's is wrong; On Oct 3rd here at Blu-ray.com, they reported that Blu-ray is growing faster than DVD at the five year mark. Read for yourself; http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=3494 - In 2002 (when DVD was 5 years old), DVD adoption was 32.6%, by 2010, Blu-ray adoption will be 34.1%. |
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