As other, more dynamic services emerged and customers complained about late fees, Blockbuster eventually went bankrupt. Today, just one store remains in Bend, Oregon. After working in computer software, Cook decided to open his own video-rental store in Dallas , Texas. His company was different than other rental stores because it offered customers a selection of 8, VHS tapes with the help of a modern, computerized check-out process, while other, smaller rental stores could only offer a couple hundred movies.
At the time, rental stores, like Blockbuster, were the only way people could watch movies that had left theaters without buying the VHS tapes themselves. Later that year, Cook left the company , as the headquarters moved to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. In , Blockbuster became the leading video-store chain in the US with stores. In , the company also expanded overseas when it bought out video-rental chain Ritz in the UK.
At this time, there were 2, Blockbuster stores. Five years later, Viacom took Blockbuster public, as the number of stores reached 6, globally. Blockbuster was known for charging customers a fee for every day they were late returning a movie rental. This frustrated many customers, including Netflix founder Reed Hastings. In its early stages, Hastings' company, which had no late fees, would send DVDs straight to your house for a flat monthly rate. Netflix went on to become even more popular and more profitable than Blockbuster.
Redbox's addition to the market reinforced the idea that people wanted quicker rental options with no late fees, so Blockbuster had to make a change. In , Viacom parted ways with Blockbuster.
That same year, the company launched Blockbuster Online, but it was already years behind Netflix. At the same time, Blockbuster decided to end late fees. At the time, there were only Blockbuster stores still in operation, Business Insider reported. In , Blockbuster declared bankruptcy, and by , all corporate-owned stores had shuttered. That left locally owned franchises like the one in Bend to fend for themselves, and one by one, they closed.
Then, in , the only other Blockbuster in Perth, Australia, shut its doors, leaving Bend as the last store. The movie also reveals that Blockbuster had an option to buy Netflix years ago, when the company was still a mail-order DVD service and hadn't transformed into the dominant streaming service it is now. The video empire's leadership, however, saw Netflix as a niche market with limited potential and declined to buy it, according to the documentary and previous news reports.
But beyond the business details, the movie taps into the nostalgia felt by people of a certain age as the world speeds up and personal interactions become less frequent, the filmmakers said. Many watching it recall working in Blockbuster stores themselves or renting from them often in their younger years. Hopefully it reminds people to appreciate the things they have now. Both filmmakers feel connected with the Bend Blockbuster, even though they are done filming their movie.
Blockbuster's troubles continued through the mids. After parting from Viacom and experimenting with in-store concepts such as DVD and game trading, Blockbuster was in the midst of an identity crisis. Its foray into video-on-demand streaming came too late, and over the next three years, Blockbuster died a slow and painful death.
DVD-by-mail services stopped, its various partnerships folded, and stores worldwide were rapidly plunged into administration. Its 9,strong chain had been reduced to one single franchise in Bend, Oregon. As a result of Blockbuster's complete shutdown, one can only speculate about what could have been for the once home-movie giant. Ash: They were too busy making money in their video stores to imagine a time when people would no longer want or need them. And in a bid to rescue their business, their answer at the time was to fight fire with fire.
At one point they even opened up rental kiosks, a little bit like a vending machine, but all of these attempts were based on either outdated technology or outdated business models, whereas Netflix at the time, they did the opposite; they streamlined, they were able to see the future of video rentals and then innovate for that future.
Blockbuster, they didn't seem to understand how the next generation, particularly millennials, who grew up in a world without hard-copy media like DVDs and CDs, how they would react to video-on-demand as technology improved. If that deal had been successful and Hastings had replicated Netflix's innovation for Blockbuster, the face of home video would likely still be blue and yellow.
The last-ever Blockbuster movie was rented on November 9, Fittingly, the film in question was "This Is the End. World globe An icon of the world globe, indicating different international options. Get the Insider App. Click here to learn more.
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