Wal-Mart Threatened by iTunes Movies?

[rdrr]

This is not an empty threat. Wal-Mart pushes around vendors like this all the time. In the end Companies want to sell their product and unfortunately Wal-Mart is the largest brick and mortar distributers. For those of you who are saying "Ban Wal-Mart", ask yourselves how many "Community X keeps Wal-Mart out" success stories have you heard of?

 

[Flernk]

Digg the story here...

http://digg.com/movies/Walmart_Retaliating_over_iTunes_Movies

 

[bretm]

Don'y boycott WalMart. Go buy DVDs there by the zillions. BUT NOTHING ELSE. Let them enjoy the losses from their loss leaders. Don't get sucked into buy some ol' roy while you're there.

 

[p0intblank]

Target is better anyway.

 

[BanjoBanker]

MS and Wal Mart?

Having spent a fair amount of time living in a rural environment, I would like to add my distaste for Wal-Mart. They move into an area with their "low prices"
and put all the local stores out of business. There are hundreds of little towns in rural areas of the south that have been devastated by the arrival of a Wal-Mart. I have had business dealings with Wal-Mart and I will tell you they do bully suppliers. I had a shipment to them with the standard invoice terms of 2% discount if paid within 10 days or net invoice if paid withing 30 days. Well, Wal-Mart paid in 90 days and took the discount! PLus they gave me a hrad time when I called them on it! I have not shopped with them in over 15 years, and I plan on keeping it that way. The fact that they sell 40% of the DVDs sold during the Christmas buying cycle does give them clout with the studios, and that is unfortunate. However, I believe that volume could be made up elsewhere, so I am not sure that the studio heads would knuckle under. They have more and more been taking a long term view, so that may diminish Wal-Mart's clout. Let us hope so.

 

[mccldwll]

Only go there when absolutely necessary, and shower after. BTW, I read somewhere of some people who every time they go to Walmart accidentally break/damage/spill something.

 

[BrandonKea]

Target is better anyway.

Yeah, all this "Boycott Wal-Mart" talk rocks. I work for Target, so come on in guys and gals!

 

[hondaboy945]

I posted in another post on this website this claim some time ago. Wal-Mart uses loss-leading priced CD sales to draw people into the store. BTW that is directly harmful to other brick and morter stores as well as medium priced online retailers. Are they apologizing for that?

It seems that since Wal-Mart tends to service the very lowest income class in our culture and many of these folks tend to not have computers, and to the extent they do, tend to not have broadband either, it seems there is a degree of mutual exclusivity of markets.

Therefore it seems Wal-Mart is less concerned about the sales themselves as the "benefits" they receive by the physical customer traffic they get from some people going to Wal-Mart to buy intentionally underpriced product so they will shop for other things while there.

BTW Wal-Mart themselves state this, so it is not speculation.

Rocketman

I was wondering how many hillbillies and other country folk have an iPod. maybe Walmart is afraid that even Billy bob wants to download instead of buying from crappy WM.

 

[hondaboy945]

Yeah, all this "Boycott Wal-Mart" talk rocks. I work for Target, so come on in guys and gals!

I totally agree. Target is sooo much better than WM. I would rather pay the extra .50 or $1 more to go to Target. Cleaner stores, nicer people, and they don't have that funny smell that WM has. And they don't want to price everyone out of business, except maybe WM. That would be great.

 

[bwintx]

Current U.S. government loves Wal-Mart, so...

Wal-Mart is a massive contributor to officeholders in both major U.S. political parties, but especially those in the Republican Party -- so anyone who seriously thinks the company will be given pause by the probable illegality of its proposed actions is dreaming.

 

[SPUY767]

I don't think Wal-Mart makes money on a lot of their DVDs. They sell them at a loss to get people in their stores. If people buy on iTunes, they don't come into Wal-Mart.

15+ dollars for a 15 cent disc with 45 cents in packaging around it shipped for about 95 cents. Walmart is making plenty. Wholesale for new DVDs is about 7 dollars less distribution costs (typically less than a dollar a disc). Older movies I have seen go for as little as 2$ wholesale.

 

[Stridder44]

FYI, for those that say "who cares about Walmart" there is this little fact (of which I'm not going to sight a source because I'm busy at work).
Walmart sells 40% of all DVDs sold in the US.
Think about that. Of all the places that sell DVDs, of all the places people go, 4 of every 10 is bought at walmart. That is ridicules power, and not something the studios will just gloss over. They will make sure they know what they are doing before making steps forward. Maybe it won't matter at all, but it isn't a number to just ignore.

I too have a well known fact, although I can't give away my source at this time.

The Banana market is going to explode soon. I have heard rumors and tails of a new generation of banana, and it's really going to change the way we live. So remember that, next time you hate on bananas.

Also, G5 Powerbooks tuesday....at least, according to my deep underground sources...which I can't talk any more about....

 

[Get Shorty]

Not cool of Wal-Mart at all... Competition is best for the consumer.

 

[840quadra]

Like many like minded Apple users (I love this group), I am one that does not shop at Wal Mart. It's buisness model is to undercut and ruin other buisnesses.

Regardless of the fact that I live in the state that is home of Target Corporation, I simply do not like Wal Mart. I have listened to stories from Contractors in southern states say not so comforting things about that company. One of the companies that we work with was not alloud to have any women or African Americans working on job sites related to building Wal Mart buildings. If the companies were caught with such employees they were fined thousands of dollars!

Wal Mart an KMA (figure it out yourself), besides if they stop selling Cds and DVD's it really wouldn't matter to me anyway, as I don't buy from them!

 

[CorvusCamenarum]

I was wondering how many hillbillies and other country folk have an iPod. maybe Walmart is afraid that even Billy bob wants to download instead of buying from crappy WM.

You'd be surprised how many people are willing to live in a trailer in order to be able to afford $300 cell phones and "designer" clothes. There's an apartment building not too far from my house which is an utter dump, and in one of the parking slots is a vintage Corvette.

Apple needs to take a page from Snapper's book regarding Wal-Mart -- give them the big fat finger. For those of you who aren't aware, Wal-Mart approached Snapper a few years ago, wanting them to make a cheap quality build of mower, put the Snapper name on it, be paid WM's crap supplier prices, and sell them exclusively in Wal-Mart stores. Long story short, Snapper didn't want poor quality (or WM for that matter) to be associated with the Snapper brand, and told WM what it could go do with itself.

 

[behindthecamera]

Where is the DOJ?

Well, that was fun. Hit "send" too soon. Where is the Justice Department? This is clearly the anti-competitive raving of a monopolistic entity.

 

[PlayUltimate]

I haven't voted yet...but this seems to be a "good" thing if only to give substantial credibility to the movie store concept. (Notice, Wal-Mart didn't scream about Amazon's store) If Wal-Mart is scared enough to bully the studios, how good of a business must it be. Eventually the studios will come around.
Further, with the massive discounts that the studios must give Wal-Mart to sell their DVDs, I don't see why the studios would not be running to Apple to sell movies. The studio's profit is probably much higher with Apple than witth Wal-Mart

 

[inkswamp]

*Sigh* One more reason to hate Wal-Mart. My wife and I stopped shopping there ages ago after talking to some of their workers (and comfirming for ourselves that the stories about forced, unpaid overtime and never-quite-materializing benefits were true) and reading about some of their business practices--much of which makes Microsoft look reasonably benign by comparison.

This kind of anti-competitive junk is exactly what we should all expect from Wal-Mart.

On a side note, I love how conservatives hold Wal-Mart up as a shining examples of American capitalism in action, but they fail to mention these kinds of practices. Making threats to keep others from entering your market is NOT how capitalism works. It's all supposed to be about competition and rising to meet your competitor's services or products. This frantic, behind-the-scenes threat-making is ridiculous and Wal-Mart should be ashamed.

 

[daddy-mojo]

It's all fun and games until someone wakes up with a dead horse head in their bed.

But seriously... $9.99 to $12.99 movie downloads when I can go over to any store (like, oh, say, Wal-Mart) and buy the real deal for a buck or two more? Just how in God's name is this a threat to them?! Wal-Mart's smartest move would be to drop their DVD prices by that buck or two, until they cost the SAME or LESS than online downloads.

LOL!!! very funny.

True enough. Just because you can download doesn't mean most people will. Even with music downloads, I still know plenty of people who never or almost never purchase their music online, they like to have the discs, same thing with movies. I know I would rather own the disc, and rip it myself for whatever format I want. Its just another option for distribution. Not the only one.

 

[dhlvrsn]

Huh?

Not one mention of the STUDIOS in this thread? Ever think that maybe they leaked/exagerated this news to take the attention off of themselves?

Oh no, big bad Wal-Mart won't let us do it...

No arguement what Wal-Mart is doing should be illegal. There is so much that goes against many laws that they somehow weasel their way around it's frightening. That said they aren't the only one nor are the ultimate problem in video distribution.

The studios are stepping over dollars to save pennies. They've put a stangle hold on content claiming to protect the artists... Look at iTunes. Even some of the most ardent opponents have now let their music be distributed that way. In the mean time they only hurt themselves.

I can't imagine that too many studios will sit back and watch Disney dominate the iTunes scene. No matter what Wal-Mart says. There is a perfectly good market for HD growing that I don't see online downloads taking over any time soon. Even with DSL I can't imagine waiting for 50GB to download...

 

[Deputy-Dawg]

.
3) Demand that all female employees shave their mustaches.

I am 73 years old, I live in Rogers, AR as does my daughter. My daughter is a Walmart employee! She does not have a mustache! The preceding remark is, in my opinion, unnecessary, cruel and sexist.

There is a great deal about Wal Mart to depise but none of them justify such a gatuitous attack on women, many of whom are single parents, that work hard there to support their families.

 

[iJon]

I am 73 years old, I live in Rogers, AR as does my daughter. My daughter is a Walmart employee! She does not have a mustache! The preceding remark is, in my opinion, unnecessary, cruel and sexist.

There is a great deal about Wal Mart to depise but none of them justify such a gatuitous attack on women, many of whom are single parents, that work hard there to support their families.

I'm sure it was all fun and games. It's hard for us Arkansans though. Desipte what reasons people hate Wal-Mart for, they are always a big deal up in our community (local NWA resident here). What I do see though is a lot of under class citizens in our neck of the woods who are able to pay for certain things that they probably couldn't afford elsewhere.

jon

 

[Manzana]

i'm concerned

doing battle with walmart, trying to get more studios and cable/tv channels on board, holding back the RIAA with a chair and a whip...apple is doing a lot to revolutionize digital media distribution, and i'm appreciative of this. but at what point will this take it's toll on macintosh computers? will apples legal and business battles compromise technological development?


waiting for C2D MBP

 

[photomaniac]

Aaaaaaarrrrrhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!

GOD! this soooooooo pissssses me off! I'm so in a rage right now... If this story is credible- then we should all join together and boycott Walmart!... I'm so mad - Walmart comes into any size town, drives out other businesses (and doesn't think twice about that!)... and now...!!! they are trying to use their strength to bully the movie studios so they can keep their huge greedy share the way it is... all because iTunes has a new/innovative way to distribute movies!! Greed Greed Greed! I know Steve Jobs has to take a professional stance on this... but we all know what he is really thinking: "F-U WALMART!"

...sorry for my rage... I really couldn't help it...

 

[kalisphoenix]

I am 73 years old, I live in Rogers, AR as does my daughter. My daughter is a Walmart employee! She does not have a mustache! The preceding remark is, in my opinion, unnecessary, cruel and sexist.

There is a great deal about Wal Mart to depise but none of them justify such a gatuitous attack on women, many of whom are single parents, that work hard there to support their families.

If it makes you feel any better, I slashed the tires of a guy the other day who was wearing a "I support single mothers" t-shirt with a silhouette of a stripper pole-dancing.