Blu-ray making greenbacks, sales up 72% to start '09
By Richard Lawler 
posted May 6th 2009 8:12PM
posted May 6th 2009 8:12PM
Congratulations Blu-ray, you might be ready to step into the zone of mass market acceptance, as NPD's retail tracking service found Q1 sales of standalone players up 72 percent over last year, moving over 400,000 units with a 14% increase in dollar sales. Last year sure the format survived mad fights but high prices were a setback; fast forward to March when an online survey of 6,994 people found awareness has reached 90 percent in the last six months, with customers fascinated by its updates. Although BD-Live is looking more and more like an unneeded gimmick, the real facts are people care about cost and average player prices dropped from $393 last year to $261 in 2009. The "Blu-ray report" suggests the magic number is $214 for folks like Shawn Marion, so more room might be needed to breeze, and could come as soon as this fall around the time Vizio's player finally appears. It might be tragic for Vudu, CBHD and others trying to get a foothold, but Blu-ray's magic wand is word of mouth - so while much talked about, but much lower selling tech like Kindle is happy as hell to get a record deal, right now Blu-ray's unique skills can't be compared.
So, in other words, total disc-based HD player sales this year are approximately the same as they were last year.
Great job Warner. You killed HD.
Yes, no smoke and mirrors (again) in those numbers at all is there.
Guys, I understand you'll never be convinced that BD is any more than a niche product, but it's a bit disingenuous to try to compare the 1Q09 BD sales to the combined HD optical disc player sales in 1Q08. HD-DVD was already DOA in the first quarter of 2008 and all retailers were dumping their remaining players at fire sale prices. That's not a sustainable business model.
I'm not totally sold that BD is going to be as mainstream as DVD is, but I'm also not ruling it out at this point either. It definitely seems to be getting a little bit of traction.
Warner killed HD? What a utterly ridicolous comment.
Warner is one of the staunchest supporters of HD as they were of DVD when it launched. It is utterly stupid to claim they killed HD by going blu. If anything they brought some much needed clarity to the market by settling on a single HD format instead of sitting on the fence - just as many consumers were doing until the matter was decided.
No point in BR.
They still make Blu-ray?
WAY TO GO BLU!!!!!!!!!! In this economy, with companies going down under and the economy in terrible shape, a 72% increase, quite a feat indeed! Let's see what happens this holiday season when players hit the $99 price point.
At Target recently, the Blu-ray isle was full of empty slots of movies, something I had not seen before. The saleswoman told me she has seen a huge increase in sales of Blu-ray movies which is why they now have a complete isle devoted to the format, as does Walmart.
I love Squiggleslashe's remark, blaming Warner for the death of HD. A 72% increase in player sales and a 280% increase in disc sales (see Home Media Retailing issue last week of April) sure shows the death of HD discs, lol.
Everyone here used to say the last holiday season was do or die for blu ray, what's next?
@DVD4ME, well as we can see it wasn't die so I guess it was do then :-)
It's bound to happen, with the full 1080p displays falling in price and more people buying them, they will want to watch movies in 1080p. BRP and BRM are dropping in price so people will continue buying them.
I just have to say Blu-Ray will replace DVD when more people learn that they can watch movies in greater detail on their new 1080p display. It's just a matter of time until HD VOD takes over in about 15 years and the bandwidth speeds and capacity can withstand millions of people streaming and downloading HD movies and shows.
Children are watching in HD and will want their content in HD now and in the future. Blu-Ray is just filling the current demand for HD content for now.
And you'd be happy as hell to get a record deal
Maybe your soul you'd sell to have mass appeal
-Gangstarr
Well gee, what a surprise. Now that standalone players cost less than the PS3, more of them are selling.
The real way to measure would be to compare all BD player sales, including both standalone and PS3s, year over year. Of course, we all know how the PS3 is faring, so the correct evaluation won't be made since there is a clear and prominent endorsement of Sony's technology here at EHD.