Alternatives killed the video store.

It's sad to admit, but my favourite job, and probably the one that I had the longest, was working as a clerk at a video store. It was a franchise operation located 5 mins. from my house. I loved it there. I got free movies all the time, the staff was fun (I became friends with my BFF there), clients were great and friendly and it was super convenient located so close to home.

Back then, when a new release movie came out on VHS, it retailed for $80-100 depending on the title. It would take numerous rentals of $5 a pop to even start breaking even on a single copy. Before I started working there, I had no idea that movies could be so costly.

Shortly after I started there, Blockbusters started popping up in the GTA and started to take away some business. They were trying to monopolize video rentals and the smaller chains, franchises and mom and pops began to fade away.

I just read in the news today that Blockbuster is losing money and they are being forced to close hundreds of their stores. With all of the alternate options today of renting a movie or obtaining a movie, it was bound to happen. Even the concept of a "video store" is archaic, as they don't even rent videos anymore and no one calls them "DVD stores". New releases of DVDs are also much cheaper than the original VHS movies. For $30 or less most of the new releases can be bought by the consumer directly.

I was a Blockbuster customer up until recently. Their marketing scheme of 'no late charges' was great because I no longer had the pressure of getting the movie back within a day or two. If I had a chance to watch it I did, but if I didn't and let it slide a few days I wouldn't be penalized. From a consumer's perspective this was genius, but from a business perspective, suicidal. Shortly after they came out with this idea, they launched a new campaign that rewarded customers for bringing back their movies earlier than the due date. Then most recently, as I'm sure their rentals were dwindling rapidly as they didn't have stock on the shelves, they rescinded these offers. They changed all their pricing to reflect multi-day rentals, but the catch was, the customer had to commit to the number days upon rental. For someone with a newborn and having no idea as to when I'd really get a chance to watch a whole movie, this option was not appealing and so I stopped renting. I'm sure other customers also were unhappy having been given a freedom and then having it snatched away. As a business owner, I get it; the point of operating a profitable business is making money, but I certainly hope the brainiac that approved the no late charges idea is working at a non-profit organization now.

I'm sure in the not so distant future, 'video stores' will completely disappear and the monopoly that Blockbuster once longed for will be meaningless. I however, will always have my very fond memories of my years as a video store clerk.