Blockbuster is dead

Blockbuster's Death Was Long Foretold - CBS News

When I was around 6 years old or so, Blockbuster opened up near my little neighborhood. It opened up about 2 blocks North of the old Video Rental store that I used to go to. When I first went to Blockbuster, I was a bit apprehensive because I hate change. But I loved it. The carpet looked so nice, I wanted to roll around on it, and everything looked so shiny. The movie covers even looked shinier. I went through the rows of kids movies, having a hard time deciding what I wanted this time, and what I wanted next time. They even had that stand for Pokemon Snap where you get to print out your pictures!

But then I realized that they were going to put the local video store out of business. Even 6 year old me knew that. And I was sad for that video store. It's where I rented my first Tekken game, and a few movies I liked. And this new, shiny Blockbuster came in out of nowhere and it was going to kill the old video store. I never went into a Blockbuster again.

Now more than 10 years later, Blockbuster has become that little video store. It's dead. One by one they are shutting down, and the buildings no longer look shiny and new, but old and abandoned. The blank signs stay up, almost like a reminder of the fallen movie store. There was one still open in the area here a few months back, but a few weeks ago, it shut down too. And I'm a bit sad. I like the convenience of websites like Netflix, but shopping for movies in store is a whole different experience. And soon it will be no more.

What were your experiences with Blockbuster? Will you miss it? Are you happy it's gone?

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Most of the Blockbusters in Canada closed over 2 years ago. And that article you linked was from September 2010, so it's no real surprise they've almost all closed around the world now.

As far as experiences with them go, I remember when you could rent GBC and N64 games from them. I also remember when they tried the whole "No late fee" thing, and that didn't really help them any xD.

I used Blockbuster for movie rentals a couple of times. Total smurfing bulltrout. They charged me $5 for a 5-day rental of a DVD? I can understand wanting a video game for 5 days, but not a smurfing movie. I'm pretty sure everyone in the smurfing country rents a movie on either the day they want to watch it or the day before. Who needs a smurfing DVD for 5 days? If you want to watch it more than once, you'll just buy the smurfing thing and keep it for a lifetime. Just a terrible, terrible model.

Redbox also charges (charged, anyway) $1 a day for DVD rentals, but you could return it on the same day or the next day and ONLY PAY ONE DOLLAR. This is a much better system for newer movies.

And then, of course, there's Netflix. $8 a MONTH for unlimited streaming? Yeah, no contest on who wins THAT debate.

Blockbuster made poor business choices, and they deserved to go out of business. That's just the way the world works. They either had to get in the game with an online service to compete with Netflix (and Gamefly, I suppose, though I haven't rented a video game in ages) and still somehow manage to turn a profit, or just get out altogether. They didn't change with the times, and they paid the ultimate price for it.

Anyways, I grew up in a rural area where we didn't really have Blockbuster around, so the "small-town video store" was my only reasonable choice. Plus, they were more reasonably priced, and you could get older movies and games if you wanted to. Both of the small-town video stores I went to growing up were closed Sundays, so you went and rented your stuff Saturday morning and you could keep it an extra day for no extra price. It was AWESOME as a kid. Ah, memories.

Blockbuster was cool and all when I was growing up, and I spent a fair amount of time in them or other local video stores in the '90s. Renting video games to try out for a few dollars was great fun, and I played a lot of PS1 and N64 games through rentals that I probably wouldn't had such video stores not existed. But then Blockbuster kept running on like it stayed the '90s, and with the increasing availability and popularity of streaming and cheaper ways to rent DVDs, it was doomed to failure. They didn't change, so they died.

Considering I haven't set foot in a Blockbuster for many years now, I can't say I'll miss it.

Wow, all the Blockbusters around here closed a few years ago. I thought it was already dead since then. I didn't go there often because there was a cheaper mom-and-pop video rental store nearby. Unfortunately that closed too D:

Blockbuster was great in the 90's, but there were many other video rental stores besides them. My family had no loyalty to any specific video rental store, but Blockbuster had the best choices of movies and/or games available most of the time.

Blockbuster isn't dead yet, I've seen some recently that have yet to close.

None around here, of course. Our Blockbuster went kaput a few years back. But the one where my mom lives in still in operation.

I have good memories of browsing the SNES aisle at the video rental store :)

Whenever I see an open and active Blockbuster, it's like seeing a white stag.

I love video rental stores in general and the novelty of wandering through the aisles for an hour looking for what you want. My dad took us to Blockbuster a bunch when I was a kid and I loved it.

They're dying because they refused to jump on the digital bandwagon about 7 or 8 years ago. That's why most people use Netflix for legit viewing.

Hollywood Video always had a better selection and reasonable rental fees.

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Originally Posted by shion

The carpet looked so nice, I wanted to roll around on it

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:freak:

Blockbuster has been burying themselves for years. I am very surprised they haven't gone out of business yet. I can't remember the last time I saw one.

Blockbuster did make a "blue box" rental kiosk similar to Redbox, but it was definitely too little, too late.

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Originally Posted by Flying Mullet

Quote:

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Originally Posted by shion

The carpet looked so nice, I wanted to roll around on it

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:freak:

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ITT: Shion likes rolling in carpet.

THE (almost) END OF AN ERA

Used to go to Blockbuster every other weekend with my dad when I was a wee lass. Some of my best memories of my dad are watching rented movies with him, and us pissing off my stepmom because we always want re-rent the same movies over and over again.

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Originally Posted by Denmark

Blockbuster did make a "blue box" rental kiosk similar to Redbox, but it was definitely too little, too late.

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It reminds me of how Kodak was one of the first companies to figure out digital cameras and then they ignored it cause they figured it would never catch on

GREAT JOB KODAK

Did Kodak go out of business? :confused:

No, but they lost the digital camera war.

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Originally Posted by Tifa's Boobs

Did Kodak go out of business? :confused:

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No but they're pretty close to it at the moment. They went bankrupt last year.

We didn't have a Blockbuster in my hometown. We had... Oh Lord... I can't even remember what it was called. We had a couple of mom 'n pop rental places. Movie Magic was one of them I believe....

I'd always heard of Blockbuster, but never experienced it until I moved to Nashville. Maybe a little before. But whatever. The main store my sister & I went to was down on Nolensville Road - not far from our apartment. And then when I turned 18, I got my own membership at that location... It shut down, so I had to go to the one closer to where I lied even though the location was pretty ghetto and they never had the good movies in.

It'd been a long time since I'd been in there, but I remembered I had a membership & I dragged my ex there.... Lo & Behold, they were having a "CLosing Out" sale - everything must go. It was rather depressing to see. ... My 'hood may not be as rough as others, but it -used- to be nice and it's gone downhill very quickly since 2006. Every store that was once popular has shut down - including the mall (which, when I was in High school, was very busy all the time). So yeah, It's sad.

The 2 gas stations directly across from our last apt complex each had Blockbuster Stands (like the Red Box), but due to.... Whatever, they got removed.... It's a sad thing to see, but at the same time, Blockbuster has no market anymore what with Netflix, Hulu+, Red Box, etc barging in.

Never went to Blockbuster.

Had great little Video99 and RainbowRentals by my place (I was still VHSing at the time too). By the time those closed down I was already pirating/streaming.

In Australia most people rent, even in a small town Blockbuster still rules... though I support the VideoEZ.

the one halfway between my house and work shut a few months back. Sucks. I actually used it.

I had never set foot into a Blockbuster until I was around 19 years old and in college. They just didn't have them in our town. There were a few in the city, but I only know of one that's left and still active.

We still have Flick Video, which is a local thing I think, in a couple of surrounding towns. I don't stream on netflix so if I want to watch something right now and not wait a few days for the DVD delivery I'll see if Flick has it. Like Shorty, sometimes I just like to wander through and see if there's anything I want to see.

The Flick video in Weaverville is particularly awesome because it has life-size Blues Brothers and a life-size Elvis.

Yeah Blockbuster is still around here. I don't remember if it was a Network Video or a Video Ezy or what, but there was an awesome store near me that always put up hilarious signs on their little thingo. They went out of business recently and their farewell sign was the most heartbreaking :(