Well a number of people have been asking ADV to release DVDs cheaper, especially last year… and now it looks like ADV is responding with their new releases of Box collection sets but also the re-released series are getting some noteworthy cuts in prices too…
July 2009 releases seem to be indicative the most of the price shifting. (Discuss July releases in PP’s thread linked to). This thread is to discuss the price reductions.
For example Godannar’s previous set is listed at $69 MSRP, the new version will be $39 MSRP ($27 preorder price).
Great news for consumers, but at what cost (cheaper packaging, less/no extras)? We’ll find out in the next few months. Anime fans have been demanding cheaper, cheaper, cheaper for years now and companies in the last year or two have been responding by cutting costs and corners… Who knows what the future will hold? Consumers have to have a limit of trying to bend companies instead of trying to break them. Let’s just hope this works out for all. From a business perspective it might be risky with the small buyer’s market. One can only hope it attracts new buyers or buyers who don’t usually buy stuff to shift into buying with reduced prices.
Having said that I can’t wait to buy a few of these, especially if there are extras on the ADV rereleases. :laugh:
July 2009 Releases:
* All Purpose Cultural Cat Girl Nuku Nuku: Complete Collection (Re-release) - $39.98
* Aquarian Age: Complete Collection - $34.98
* Burn Up! (Re-release) - $14.98
* Grave of the Fireflies - $19.98
* MD Geist - $14.98
* Mezzo: Complete Collection (Re-release) - $34.98
* Now and Then, Here and There: Complete Collection - $29.98
* The World of Narue: Complete Collection - $29.98
* Those Who Hunt Elves: Complete Collection - $39.98
Look at it this way. You make less of them, with a cheaper initial price, they sell out, when they start going for triple or quadruple that on eBay, release another run of the same edition.
Or release them with a high initial price, and end up with copies sent back or that cost you money to refund the retailers when they sell them to RSI who puts them in their bargain bin for 10-15% of the original price.
Certainly that’s an excellent point and most likely the main reason they are doing it. Returns have hurt all the companies in the industries big time over the last few years.
Simplistically, for example, selling 2 at say $50, makes them more money than say selling 3 at $30. Now the question is will their gamble pay off to expand the market via cheaper prices while still making money. In the past it hasn’t always worked out by selling cheaper.
It possible they read my post on the pontential of the market being potential saturated. My post was not ment to change prices, remember I was questioning the schedule of the releases. Techincally the longer ADV waited the more they could have charged more. The fact they are charging less prove my point.
Now and Then, Here and There: Complete Collection, I am surprised it is not $34.98.
Since the price has been reduced, I am waiting for ADV to release World of Narue.
Most like I will be buying “Grave of the Fireflies” and “Now and Then, Here and There”
What point is that? Because I think you’re missing the point of this news entirely. ADV’s goal isn’t to charge more, that’s the point of this thread. They are trying to reduce costs, and they have been doing this for a year + now already by offering consumers more accessible prices - which is an industry wide trend in the last few years due to many factors.
ADV listens to its customers throughout the landscape of the internet, but with all due respect I doubt this decision had anything to do with what you said 2 weeks ago when the news came out of ADV’s releasing Central Park Media titles. If anything, ADV wasn’t listening since they increased the July solicitations with more releases and made them cheaper and is now in alignment with their previous release with the new CPM title rescues. Somehow I think they knew about the market being saturated due to their 5+ years of sales data from various retailers across North America. This has been a long discussed problem in the industry due to the bubble bursting and the contracting of the market for the last few years.
Summer is a down-trend month this year with a lot of re-releases from many companies, due to the state of the retail market. ADV is obviously trying to capitalize on this trend with cheaper releases for accessibility to wider consumer bases but also striking while the iron is hot during the big convention months.
Again this is nothing new, ADV made this move prior to your comments and the Central Park Media license rescue and price announcements were a signpost of what was to come, and now further established by new solicitations per above.
But Blue Seed has been 5 times, I think every 6 months there is a new one, I have no problems with repackaging old anime, but I think Blue Seed has past Eva, that is unbelievable. There are other shows ADV could do, heck they haven’t done an Eva for about 3 years, and the movie is coming out this fall.
They have released that. ADV Films released Neon Genesis Evangelion Complete Platinum Collection (Holiday Edition) 6 months ago.
I remember your old list where you reiterated my list of Steel Angel Kurumi and Princess Nine… but since we’re in a new forum, which other titles did you want to see ADV re-release or put back in print?
As far as ADV as a whole, according to their public statements, there are some older Out of Print titles and stuff never before on DVD they are looking into putting out again.
I think actually on a product that’s already done and paid for itself, the lower prices don’t make a huge dent in the profit. Maybe they take 40% less actual profit per item, but if the initial release at the higher price also cost 40% more because of the production costs, it’s a wash. Cutting the price is an effort to make the same profit level or close to it on an existing product.
And with a re-release the demand is going to be lower, so keeping it at the same price would increase the odds of having to eat one out of every three or four, that would wipe out the difference in profit of selling the other three at the higher price.
Another reason companies keep re-releaseing things is to keep a show on the market. If they keep re-releaseing Mezzo DSA for example, the longer it will stay on B&M shelves, since by the time the first set is done and copies that didn’t sell sent back, a new set can be made and put on the shelves. This way anyone looking for that show can find it easily. However I’m not sure 100 re-releases of a title will do them any good either. You have to balance re-releases with new titles, and not release something too fast after the last time it was released.
This doesn’t exactly sound like a good idea, they keep sending the same 3-4 shows that don’t sell and don’t put in new shows that may sell, it is one problem with getting rid of singles and just going to sets, the first release is already the best you can get.
The alternative is OOP and it’s far too complex to discuss in great detail with any sort of simplification. But it’s not as simple as you think either, otherwise lots of other OOP or rare DVDs would be released with more frequency. It’s not like they can just print or resend whatever and it’ll be carried. According to RACS, Funimation told them that Best Buy won’t be carrying like 50% of their new July releases. If even they can’t get shelf space… nothing is a given. It’s very, very hard right now, and companies are doing what they can to get past these hard times.
This may have a lot to do with Best Buy.
From what the head of Media Blaster has said Best Buy more or less is forcing companies to switch to slimmer packaging and ADV probably was forced to re-release these in a new slim single case release or not have them on the shelf at all.
The cheaper price point should help these to move as at BB discount these come up about $5.00 to $10.00 cheaper then MSRP.
Of course its a risk no matter how you slice it but its a risk they are probably forced to take.
Gantz this is the first below below $80.00 MSRP set.
Most of the sets except a few have a decent price difference from the older sets which may also help to move these.
These are not being aimed at us older crowd but at the people who browse the shelves looking for cheap all in one set that passed on the older ones because they thought that $5.00 to $40.00 more was to high.
Of course the cost of this is your going to be getting some iffy packaging in most cases.
Funimation’s problem may be they have to much stagnation on the shelves now and really stores look at that as meaning “What they got does not sell so why carry all of their releases from them?”
I like the slim packs, I can get the DVD out of the packaging easy since a cheap soft plastic is being used. I like thin pack as long as the disk are not three stacked.
Black Lagoon complete set seem to have really expensive packaging. The hardest DVD I have to get out of a case.
To some extent, the big packaging has forced bigger room for Anime.
If everything were to be packed in Thin packs, A large variety of title would be needed to hold the same space.
Actually no more and more B&M stores are slimming back video offerings and Anime is getting the biggest cut. Which means they are being forced to go smaller to keep more on lesser shelf space.
My Suncoast and FYE for example its a harder to notice but the Anime shelf space has been cut by at least 25% in the last year.
Both seem to have added more Manga and figures though.
Some of the FYE have started to merge the Hentai titles in with the Anime.
My Best Buy they re-did the shelving arrangement which looks like more but its actually less.
Though I noticed the other sections appear to have gotten smaller as well.
They seemed to have redone it to get people to walk through instead of around.
A lot of people are indeed shopping online but the B&M retail chain market is where you attract new buyers which can be more important then the old ones.
The real dilemma is do they try to please new generation or the old.
New wants it cheap and fast as possible Quality be damned and the old wants assurance , quality and , sex appeal but not at a high price if possible.
Can’t please all the primates and there in lies the the problem.
Somehow I think they knew about the market being saturated due to their 5+ years of sales data from various retailers across North America. This has been a long discussed problem in the industry due to the bubble bursting and the contracting of the market for the last few years.
So I’m not gonna re-iterate it again.
and there in lies the the problem.