HomeWeekly News Roundup (December 4, 2016)
Welcome to another edition of the Weekly News Roundup. A new week has definitely passed, but unfortunately, due to Thanksgiving probably and me being busy with other stuff, there’s not much to talk about (or more precisely, there’s no news to talk about at all).
So instead, I’ll use this blank canvas to ramble incoherently about DVD, Blu-ray and 4K sales, as a preview to my yearly Blu-ray: The State of Play series.
Regular readers will know that I’ve been keeping track of weekly U.S. Blu-ray and DVD sales numbers for quite a few years now, and every year, I write the “State of Play” to summarise how the year went in terms of sales, and looks at trends. Even though we are without probably the best weeks of the year in terms of sales, I thought I would offer a preview of what the year has been like so far for Blu-ray sales.
Is Ultra HD Blu-ray helping total disc sales?
It’s an important year because a new Blu-ray format, Ultra HD Blu-ray, was introduced, and the popularization of streaming continued unabated. So it’s important to take a look to see if discs are still a thing that people want. More importantly, has 4K had a positive effect on the format (considering that 4K UHD Blu-ray sales are counted as Blu-ray sales in the stats I provide weekly).
Looking at the stats, the short answer is yes, 4K has helped Blu-ray record a turn-around!
2015 was not a good year for discs, and not a good year for Blu-ray. Blu-ray revenue had declined for the second year running, and it certainly appears that “peak Blu-ray” or even “peak disc”, where the peak for Blu-ray/disc sales, had already been reached some time in 2013.
But 2016 is turning out to be quite different, at least for the first 47 weeks so far of the year, and the turning point came in March, when the first Ultra HD Blu-ray discs were released.
Let me go into some more detail for you. Of the 52 weeks in 2015, thirty weeks (that’s close to 58% of the weeks) had a Blu-ray revenue result that was lower than the same week in 2014, compared to 22 weeks (42%) that had recorded a rise in Blu-ray revenue.
Studios aren’t shy to bring their biggest hits to UHD Blu-ray
For 2016 so far, it has reversed, where 21 weeks (45%) were worse compared to 26 weeks (55%) that were better. Looking at the same time period (the first 47 weeks) in 2015, Blu-ray revenue was 7.6% lower than the same period in 2014, but comparing 2016 to 2015, Blu-ray revenue is now up 2.3%. That’s what I call a turnaround!
Now looking at the first 11 weeks of 2016 that did not include any Ultra HD Blu-ray sales, 6 of these weeks were worse than the same weeks in 2016, only 5 were better. Revenue for this period had fallen 6.1% compared to a year ago.
So in other words, before Ultra HD Blu-ray, revenue was falling at about the same rate as in 2015, but since then, revenue has actually risen. Ultra HD Blu-ray has had a very positive effect on Blu-ray sales.
None of this should be a surprise for those that have been following the WNR. I’ve mentioned many times that studios have been very proactive in releasing titles on UHD Blu-ray, and that the UHD version is selling quite well given how new the format it (it frequently beats the 3D version of the same film). And studios are only keen to push UHD because there are lots of households already with 4K, thanks to a lower than expect price premium to upgrade to the format (relatively speaking, of course).
Now with that said, the final few weeks of 2016 could still change things around, depending on how receptive people are to Ultra HD Blu-ray during this crucial sales period. But given that the Xbox One S is expected to sell very well in the U.S. during the holidays, and the Xbox One S includes an Ultra HD Blu-ray player, it’s quite possible the sales growth will actually intensify during the next few weeks.
We’ll have to wait a few more weeks before I can confirm were Blu-ray revenue will end up, and even if my hypothesis is correct and that 4K is helping sales, it’s hard to tell if this boost is just a temporary one on the transition away from discs.
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More news (or some news) next week, I promise. Have a good one!