A great report from Video Business News. All indications are that Iron Man Blu-ray was a bigger seller than anyone expected. Enjoy, I did!
Iron Man blasts out on Blu-ray
By Susanne Ault -- Video Business, 10/7/2008
OCT. 7 | Iron Man is enjoying superhero Blu-ray Disc strength, tracking as the top format debut to date at Best Buy and other retailers.
An average of about 20% of Iron Man’s total unit sales are on Blu-ray, according to retail sources, though in some instances, its share goes as high as 50%. By comparison, the Blu-ray portion for many recent popular titles, including I Am Legend, logged about 9% of sales in the format, according to Adams Media Research.
One industry source said Iron Man Blu-ray sales range from 10% to 30% of the title’s total sales, varying by retailer. In some isolated cases, including at retailers Amazon.com and DeepDiscount.com, Iron Man’s Blu-ray version is selling more briskly than one or more of the film’s standard DVD SKUs.
Paramount Home Entertainment bowed Iron Man on Sept. 30. The studio has not yet commented on the title’s sales.
According to retailers, one key reason behind the movie’s success on Blu-ray is its appeal to comic book, special effects and videogame fans—the crowd most likely to be early adopters and own PlayStation 3 consoles, which playback Blu-ray discs.
The title also is attractively priced at $39.99, the same price as the standard two-disc special edition. And with Blu-ray offering extensive format-exclusive Web interactivity, consumers seem happy to upgrade to the more advanced version, retailers said.
“In week-one sales, this is our biggest Blu-ray title ever,” said Best Buy spokesman Brian Lucas. “This was a tentpole title for the format. If you have a Blu-ray player, this is the title that you want to get.”
Lucas is confident that Iron Man’s Blu-ray power bodes well for the entire format going forward.
“I think it’s a sign that Blu-ray adoption is reaching a point where there is excitement around certain titles that fit well in the format,” he said. “This is now becoming an expected format, where on new release Tuesday, people are now coming and looking for the movie on Blu-ray.”
Iron Man also is the best first-week Blu-ray performer for airport retailer InMotion Entertainment, regional chain Newbury Comics and online seller DeepDiscount.com.
In its first week on sale at In Motion, Iron Man sold through 75% of its Blu-ray copies and 50% of its total copies. Typically, InMotion sells 35% of a title’s copies during that frame.
“This is the first Blu-ray title to crack our Top 10 DVD sellers for the week,” said Steve Torr, InMotion director of software purchasing and rental services. “I hope it’s a sign of the future for Blu-ray.”
Iron Man’s Blu-ray sales represented 20% of the total 1,800 copies sold across Newbury’s 28-store chain. That is double the usual Blu-ray portion for titles sold at the retailer. Iron Man’s Blu-ray sales just about equaled Newbury’s first-week sales of the two-disc standard DVD version of Sex and the City: The Movie.
DeepDiscount.com consumers purchased twice as many copies of Iron Man on Blu-ray than the two-disc standard version, and Blu-ray accounted for 50% of the title’s total sales.
“The two-disc [standard for Iron Man] is just $1 dollar less than its Blu-ray,” said David Barker, VP of e-commerce marketing at DeepDiscount.com owner Infinity Resources, referring to the site’s retail pricing. “I think the two-disc [fan-oriented] buyer is trading up—this is the first person who is converting to Blu-ray anyway.”
At Amazon.com, the Blu-ray Iron Man SKU wound up topping its two-disc and single-disc standard versions in its overall top DVD sellers chart. After its first week, Iron Man is the top-selling Blu-ray title of 2008 at the retailer.
“Amazon.com has had other Blu-ray movies highly ranked, but we have never before seen a Blu-ray title dominate the top seller rankings for an extended period like Iron Man,” said Amazon.com spokeswoman Tammy Hovey. “A handful of other Blu-ray titles have outsold the standard-def version, but Iron Man is by far the most significant. Iron Man Blu-ray has been in the Top 10 of Amazon’s DVD bestseller list since early September and has been ranked No. 1 or No. 2 most of the last two weeks.”
If Iron Man is a typical blockbuster release you can figure that it sold at least 5 million copies.
If so, and the 20% number is true, that's over 1 million Blu-Rays...
And the 5 million could be conservative, big blockbusters in 2007 were pushing 8 million copies their first week.
Having said that, there's a lot that could be wrong, the 20% might not be industry-wide, the economy might have quite reduced the number of overall sales, etc.
If Iron Man is a typical blockbuster release you can figure that it sold at least 5 million copies.
If so, and the 20% number is true, that's over 1 million Blu-Rays...
And the 5 million could be conservative, big blockbusters in 2007 were pushing 8 million copies their first week.
Having said that, there's a lot that could be wrong, the 20% might not be industry-wide, the economy might have quite reduced the number of overall sales, etc.
1 million might be pushing it Anything over 500,000 is great news! Maybe we will see a release for BD unit sales numbers for the first week of sales, either tonight or tomorrow morning.
1 million might be pushing it Anything over 500,000 is great news! Maybe we will see a release for BD unit sales numbers for the first week of sales, either tonight or tomorrow morning.
If the 20% figure is correct and the Blu doesn't push one million, than Iron Man was a failed release from a Blockbuster standpoint.
Then again, maybe this is why Paramount isn't out there showing off numbers.
how it can be a failed release if it doesn't reach 1,000,000? this is not the dvd. blu-ray is not mass adopted yet. so i don't think that iron man was ever going to shift a 1,000,000 units in one week. if it even does 500,000 then that's really great. in one week that's not a failed release.
how it can be a failed release if it doesn't reach 1,000,000? this is not the dvd. blu-ray is not mass adopted yet. so i don't think that iron man was ever going to shift a 1,000,000 units in one week. if it even does 500,000 then that's really great. in one week that's not a failed release.
Because if the BD sold 20% of the DVD and the DVD didn't sell 5 million copies or more, it would not be considered blockbuster type sales. How many copies did the Transformers DVD sell the first week? I would expect this to sell more.
Because if the BD sold 20% of the DVD and the DVD didn't sell 5 million copies or more, it would not be considered blockbuster type sales. How many copies did the Transformers DVD sell the first week? I would expect this to sell more.
Transformers DVD sold 8.3 million in its first week.
how it can be a failed release if it doesn't reach 1,000,000? this is not the dvd. blu-ray is not mass adopted yet. so i don't think that iron man was ever going to shift a 1,000,000 units in one week. if it even does 500,000 then that's really great. in one week that's not a failed release.
As atomik said, if the Blu-Ray sold 20% of the total sales, and it didn't sell one million, this is a failure for Iron Man, not for Blu-Ray.
damn! this title, along with Indiana Jones, the new hulk movie, and that batman movie is going to make waves
Great Article! I agree that between this movie and some of the other big movies coming out before christmas, this is going to be a great season for BLU!!!!
how it can be a failed release if it doesn't reach 1,000,000? this is not the dvd. blu-ray is not mass adopted yet. so i don't think that iron man was ever going to shift a 1,000,000 units in one week. if it even does 500,000 then that's really great. in one week that's not a failed release.
Fail for the DVD, not the BD. It's the 20% logic:
If 20% sold were BD, and less than one million BD sold, then less than 5 million DVD sold and that would be poor sales for a blockbuster DVD.
The 20% is probably the suspect number, but we shall see.
Gary
Edit: Actually, assuming they mean 20% of the total, then at 1 million BD it would mean 4 million DVD. 1 million would be 20% of the total of 5 million.
Last edited by dialog_gvf; 10-08-2008 at 09:27 PM.
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Iron Man blasts out on Blu-ray!!!
Anything over 500,000 is great news! Maybe we will see a release for BD unit sales numbers for the first week of sales, either tonight or tomorrow morning.
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