Blockbuster vs Netflix: Why You Should Sign Up For Both
July 24, 2007
How can you save money on movie rentals by signing up for both Blockbuster online and Netflix? It’s pretty simple really, the battle between Blockbuster and Netflix in the home movie rental industry gives you a lot of leverage as a consumer. You can use this leverage to get free and cheap movies.
Enjoy Free Movies
Both Blockbuster and Netflix have had offers of the first month free for new customers. We took advantage of these offers to get free movies for the majority of two summers. After our one-month trial with Blockbuster online was over I called and complained about some aspect of the service that wasn’t up to par and got another free month. The wonderful thing about the competitive market is that companies will do what they can to make you happy and try to keep you as a customer.
My wife went back to work at the end of summer and we canceled our Blockbuster subscription. The next summer I did the same with Netflix, then canceled when the free movies were done. Almost two summers worth of movies for free! One thing to be aware of. Make sure you send your movies back prior to the end of your free trial or they will charge you for another month of service the first day after the promotion ends. I was able to talk them into a refund but it was a hassle, so get them in on time.
Competition is Good for You
Once the free trials are over the fun begins! What’s better than being a preferred customer? How about being a former customer? Both Blockbuster online and Netflix know you’re interested in renting movies and for all they know you have switched to the competing service. Why should they try and find new customers when they know you are a good lead AND they know how to get a hold of you. Instead they’ll try and lure you back to their camp.
You will start getting e-mails from Netflix, “come back to us and we’ll give you this great special”. We received coupons in the mail from Blockbuster this summer that allowed us to rent any movie we wanted for only a $1.99. Once we were in the store they tried to sign us up for Blockbuster by mail but we weren’t interested.
The current price war between Blockbuster and Netflix keeps driving down the price of online video rental while the price of gas keeps climbing. So skip the trip to the video store. Take advantage of your spot in this battle, sign up for both Blockbuster and Netflix and enjoy the spoils!
All posts by Ben Edwards
I have used both Blockbuster and Netflix. But in comparison I was with Netflix for 4 years and the wait time kept getting longer even for average rated movies in my Queue. to recieve a movie with a short or long wait I had to empty my queue and it shortend waits just a bit, many weekends I did not recieve my 3 Netflix movies. Since I started using blockbuter nearly a year ago, I no longer suffer long waits and get what I want. The only drawback is that Blockbuster takes at least 1 extra day to process movies returned via mail. The other problem is it takes them 3 days to process movies returned in a store. Overall, if you stick with mail I have found blockbuster to be much better.
@ Limeade:
Good tip — just beware of identity theft schemes involving redbox. My colleague wrote about it here:
http://blogs.creditcards.com/2008/04/rent-movies-lose-your-identity.php
You can probably work this for quite awhile before they catch on. But even, then I think they will allow most people to continue with this tactic. Most people don’t have the discipline to continually cancel!
Thanks for the tip limeade! Great, another competitor to help drive prices down even further, alright!
My wife and I rent movies from Redbox, which is a DVD vending machine that can be found in MacDonald’s and different grocery stores. They only cost $1 a day, but you can find promotional codes that lets you rent them for free. Just visit http://www.insideredbox.com.
Just a little tip that we use.