just been informed by letter from blockbuster u.k - we are sorry to tell you blockbuster canterbury store is closing on sunday the 8th of july 2012,but you're a valuable customer and we would love to welcome you to our fantastic online service.. blah,blah,blah and so on...
even though admittedly they were overpriced and didn't always carry the titles i was after i will miss it as somewhere i could pop in and have a good old browse around to see what was coming out and what had just been released.
i've rented more than my fair share of titles from them over the years and they would often do a deal where you could rent any 4 blu rays/dvds for £10 what i didn't think was bad value for money at all.
also i always found the staff in there very friendly and the manager has been there since the store first opened i think over 15yrs ago,i feel for these guys losing there jobs when there's so little employment out there in the u.k (and everywhere else) at the moment.
is there anyone here on the rewind who's still got a blockbuster store operating near them?
Posted by P_a_u_l (Member # 1022) on :
There's one in Basingstoke, and I believe there's still a small one just outside Maidenhead. I've brought movies from Blockbuster recently but haven't rented a DVD for a good few years now. Streaming works so well, and the cost of non-current DVDs is so cheap, that it was always a business model that was going to end at some point.
I remember the Canterbury store - driven psat it many a time when visiting relatives in Whitstable or Dover, and was starting to wonder how they could maintain such a large store these days....
Posted by gordongecko (Member # 4685) on :
Man, it's crazy to think how old of an idea video rental stores are now. Growing up we had them at all the grocery stores and then we also had a few neighborhood stores. It was always so fun looking through all the movies and video games as a kid. I really do miss that.
Posted by the young warrior (Member # 9554) on :
yeh paul of the few blockbuster stores i've been to in the kent area the canterbury store did seem on the large side.
i agree it's suprising they've managed to keep some of there stores going for as long as they have,from the times when i first started using blockbuster many years back you would normally expect queues of about 10-20 people.
compared to the last few times where you could grab your title and go straight to the counter and be back out the door again before you knew it.
i currently use lovefilm online rental service and stream the odd movie from numerous other sites,not tried netflix as of yet.
paul most of my relatives live in dover,they live in a place called river,if you get chance (you might have already been) there's a really nice park there called kearsney abbey that's worth a visit.
kearsney abbey,river,dover.
Posted by the young warrior (Member # 9554) on :
i know what you mean gordon, i really miss those days as well!
need to get me a time machine,i know i'll check ebay someone on there will probably have one Posted by P_a_u_l (Member # 1022) on :
quote:Originally posted by the young warrior: yeh paul of the few blockbuster stores i've been to in the kent area the canterbury store did seem on the large side.
i agree it's suprising they've managed to keep some of there stores going for as long as they have,from the times when i first started using blockbuster many years back you would normally expect queues of about 10-20 people.
compared to the last few times where you could grab your title and go straight to the counter and be back out the door again before you knew it.
i currently use lovefilm online rental service and stream the odd movie from numerous other sites,not tried netflix as of yet.
paul most of my relatives live in dover,they live in a place called river,if you get chance (you might have already been) there's a really nice park there called kearsney abbey that's worth a visit.
kearsney abbey,river,dover.
Small world! My relatives pretty much live in Temple Ewell, most of them all on Temple Side, which is the road opposite the run down through River to the Abbey (come out of town along the Canterbutry road, and you can turn right into Temple Side or left down under the arches to the Abbey).
I've spent many times at Kearsney Abbey, loads of family parties at the village hall up on the Canterbury Road, and have relatives scattered all around the town!
Posted by Devolution (Member # 1731) on :
Devolution here,
Unlimited streaming was the death of the powerhouse video store. Much like Blockbuster was the death of the "mom and pop" video store 20 years ago.
We are DEVO
Posted by P_a_u_l (Member # 1022) on :
So we need to look 20 years into the future to see what will be the death of the 'unlimited streaming' companies?
My guess will be something similar to the holo-bands in Caprica, although probably not as sophisticated, so that movie entertainment becomes truly 3D/Total Immersion....
Posted by gordongecko (Member # 4685) on :
If you get a time machine off ebay, can you at least get a Delorean?
Posted by the young warrior (Member # 9554) on :
i don't know if i'll be able to make it a delorean gordon,i once had a bad experience in one of those, universal studios - back to the future ride,i went a very funny colour,and you guess what happened next.
i think it's safe to say i suffer from motion sickness
before blockbuster came to canterbury there used to be video store known as tower of pleasure,i think it later came to be known as tower video and it was a small store but jammed packed with 1000s of vhs/beta releases.
i used to really dig going in there,you could hardly move for customers,everyone seemed to be fighting over the same releases and there would be long waiting list for most of the titles- my family had to wait for over a month to get our hands on the cannonball run.
but it was great, all these different covers staring at ya,especially before the video nasties act kicked in,i remember i kept begging my mother to get last house on the left but she wouldn't budge.
i can also remember more or less when blockbuster came to town you could tell the tower video store was dying a death,people left in there droves
like devo said things tend to go full circle and it was only a matter of time before blockbuster got a taste of its own medicine so to speak.
came across this video on youtube about the closure of a mom and pop video store and the reasons why the owner believed people liked to visit - http://youtu.be/eqVWA1eaB-0 - these looked like pretty cool rental outlets and remind me very much of my old video haunt.
yeh it's a small world paul, i got chatting once to a person outside the chinese mann theatre in los angeles and can you guess where they came from - dover,u.k - it seem's like popular place!
[ 13. June 2012, 16:04: Message edited by: the young warrior ]
Posted by gotta go back (Member # 9818) on :
There were 2 Blockbusters in Blue Springs, Missouri a couple months ago(population of approx 52000). The 2 stores combined leaving only 1 store. Also, another one closed down in a bordering city about the same time. They were selling DVDs for $1 at the end. A sign would be a cool piece to own.
Posted by Ronnie (Member # 465) on :
Wow.. I still have at least 5 Blockbuster stores around me, which I still go to. Guess business is doing ok around here. Their regular dvd selection has gone down a lot, with blu ray titles expanding. They've added entertainment system areas with couches.. a large game section and still a lot of merch and used movies.
I still enjoy going to the vid store browsing through the movies to rent.
I can't say much for the staff, for the people in the stores nearby seem to know very little about movies and never recommend anything.
I started out working there after I graduated and loved it. Right about when vhs was changing over to dvd. Wow..
Wish it wasn't coming to an end, but seems to be the case. I wonder how long dvds will last as well. How much longer before all the money we poured into our collections will have been all for not? Ha.. If everything goes completely digital.. what about the special features/commentaries that most of us enjoy. Just a thought.
Posted by Pyro (Member # 7658) on :
Yeah, its just all about location. Back when I was living in WA, they still had a few stores around. But for the ones that seemed to be doing ok in business, there were just as many, if not more that closed down. Hell, there were even a couple Mom & Pop video stores nearby that still rented out VHS tapes. And they seemed to be doing even better than most. I guess that's a clue that there are more nostalgics out there than they might have guessed. Maybe if Blockbuster took a hint and started stocking VHS tapes again, they might find that business would pick up again.
Posted by gordongecko (Member # 4685) on :
Young Warrior.....THE WAITTING LIST!!! I totally forgot about that! Get on the list and they'll call you when it's your turn! Awesome. Best part was it was just a sheet of paper on a clipboard at the place by my house.
Posted by the young warrior (Member # 9554) on :
that was the trouble with the waiting list gordon,there used to be so many people in front of you by the time you had waited to get your hands on say something like friday the 13th for the first time they had released a further 3 or more sequels
[ 19. June 2012, 15:34: Message edited by: the young warrior ]
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