The successful Blu-ray release of The Lion King and the home video debut of Fast Five resulted in a new weekly Blu-ray revenue share record. For the week ending 10/08/11, Blu-ray's market share of total package media sales was an all time best 40%. The new mark bested the previous record of 35% established on the week ending 9/17/11, which marked the initial bow of Star Wars.
Home Media Research estimates that Blu-ray sales of The Lion King topped 1.5 million units, and Fast Five contributed by selling over 1 million Blu-ray copies. Blu-ray revenue for the week registered a new 2011 high of $73.09, which bettered the year's previous best of $57.32 million. The increase of Blu-ray sales receipts over the same week last year was 57.7%. In 2011, Blu-ray's market share has increased 35% over 2010.
Ha at Fast Five being one of the best movies ever. That whole franchise works simple off of kids with econobox cars who think big fart cannon exhausts, park bench wings and plastic body kits will let them run with the big boys.
Shin, the comparison is total Blu-ray sales revenue for the week vs total DVD sales revenue for the week.
TLK's revenue is attributed to Blu. Same thing will happen for the current week as POTC 4 did not get a DVD release.
Fast Five and The Lion King being at the top spot is no surprise to me,both are great movies...reguardless of how you feel about the movies themselves, this is a win for the format.
Both of those movies only came in BD/DVD combo packs, just in two different kinds of packaging accentuating either BD or DVD first. Evey single unit sold was probably counted as a BD. Either way, great numbers.
Its matched against last year's 2010 week where Disney's Beauty and the Beast's Blu-ray and DVD combo packs in both DVD and Blu-ray style packaging also all counted as Blu-ray only sales.
Last year was also the second week of Iron Man 2 while this is the second week of Transformers: Dark of the Moon so its apples to apples there too. Fast Five this year vs The Karate Kid and Nightmare on Elm Street were the other major titles.
@denger76: I wish you were right but I do not think so. This season is as good as it will ever get for Blu-ray. Have a look at what's planned for the first three months of 2012. It's like a desert. Only a few new films and some cultie faves. Almost nothing from any studio's catalogue. Instead of building on this fall's momentum the studios are clearly pulling back. I do expect some great titles to be released next year but not the real opening of the vaults that many of you here have been waiting for patiently since 2006. The one exception is Criterion but they're a specialised and expensive taste. The other studios all seem to think that the future is downloading and streaming not physical discs. It makes sense from their standpoint as there's more control that way.
Ultimately, this isn't a shock -- BD sales start rising when they release quality content that people want to buy. HUGE catalogs like The Lion King and Star Wars do that. Big hit new theatricals like Fast Five and the recent superheroes movies do that.
Plus, as mentioned, The Lion King rerelease didn't start out with a DVD-only option... so ALL sales of it went in the BD bucket.
@reidw, I could not disagree more. Blu-ray will overtake DVD in revenue and sales in 2012...there's ZERO doubt about that. For the past month BD sales have driven disc revenue past 2010 numbers. January is a very slow month for releases, but more titles will be added. Usually high profile titles are announced months in advance, but thta it not the case for the average release. The performance of Blu-ray, as far as generating sales, in Q3 and Q4 has been great.
Fast Five was an awesome BD. PQ & AQ are top notch and a good ass movie to boot. I haven't watched the Lion King blu ray yet but I'm sure it's tops as well. Go Blu !!!!
You are really incorrect in those sentiments. Blu-ray is generating revenues right now and its support will continue even stronger in 2012 after a strong 4Q 2012 period.
First off the studios have not announced the 2012 releases and there will be a lot of studio library catalog titles released , we just do not know what they will be yet. The new theatrical releases for fall 2012 will be the 1Q 2012 home video releases as well. Its too early to complain about the releases scheduled in 2012. The amount of catalog releases has greatly increased in 2011 and will continue to accelerate in 2012.
Pretty much every new to Blu-ray catalog title is incremental revenues to the studios now and each month the catalog titles sell more units on release so the studios will continue to harvest those revenues even as they pursue other digital options like UltraViolet for the future. Physical discs will continue to generate billions and billions in sell through and rental income and no one is just going to through that away.
Every major catalog title released new to Blu-ray is basically new found revenues for the studios and retailers so they will continue for many years to come. That will happen hand in hand with the growth of the cloud based stuff which has so much potential for the future.
A lot of Blu-ray hardware will be sold this all and the amount of catalog releases will be even better in 1Q 2012 than it was for this year.
Studios look at digital cloud based stuff in its infancy for generating revenues and with Blu-ray hitting its stride in 3Q 2012 (up +50% YoY) and records now being set weekly in the past month and strong releases in the 4Q 2012 the studios and retailers will continue to maximize DVD and more importantly Blu-ray profits for many years to come as the pure digital cloud based revenue streams slowly mature.
@blushadow: Please check back with me in April and show me all the good catalogue titles released on BD in Q1. I think you are being over optimistic. I agree that BD is having a very strong Q4 both financially and from a quality of product standpoint but checking the list of titles announced for Q1 so far I fear that any momentum built up this quarter is not going to be sustained in Q1 of next year. There was much more from the vaults already announced a year ago for Q1 of 2011 than we have so far for Q1 of 2012. Frankly I hope I'm wrong. I'm no fan of the "cloud" as I feel it gives too much control to suppliers who can pull the "plug"/screw their customers in a variety of ways. Unfortunately that's the way the industry is going. The trend is there. Enjoy this season of great classic/catalogue releases on BD but don't expect it to continue. This is as good as it will get for BD.
I remember someone doing this exact same doom-crying over the state of new releases for January at this time last year. Was it you, reidw? SOMEONE sure was making a big stink about blu-ray being over, and 2010 was the peak, and no good stuff was going to be released in 2011, and this was the end of physical media and also the world. And I have to say, it HAS been a stark year for blu-ray catalog releases, with only small little cult films like Bambi, the Ten Commandments, the Incredibles, Beverly Hills Cop, the Superman Anthology, the Lord of the Rings Extended Editions, the Blues Brothers, Animal House, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, the Big Lebowski, Citizen Kane, Dumbo, Airplane!, Pulp Fiction, the Lion King, the Jurassic Park Trilogy, West Side Story, My Fair Lady, and all six Star Wars movies being released. In other words, nothing that anyone would want to see, really. So, since you were right about 2011 (assuming it WAS you doing the doom-crying), I guess we have to assume that 2012 will continue the downward spiral you predicted for 2011.
