Deathstalker / Message from Space / Timewalker / Up from Depths / Velvet Vampire (LE)

[Optimus-Prime-Rox]

Originally Posted by HD Goofnut

Just out of curiosity I wanted to look up number of topless scenes from Deathstalker. I thought it was about 10. It's over 25 : http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087127/...ef_=tt_stry_pg

Loved Lana Clarkson & Barbie Benton in the movie, such a shame that Phil Spector guy killed Lana Clarkson.

I only wish that the Deathstalker set was getting a wider release so that I could get it at a later time when I could afford it, I'm a bit tapped out on what I can spend right now since I already have so many movies on pre-order.

[McCrutchy]

Originally Posted by StingingVelvet

There's a pretty massive difference between their normal releases and these. These are pure schlock trash really. They likely thought there was no market for them, but hey let's see what happens this way. I don't see how anyone could not understand how small the audience is for this stuff.

So the appropriate solution, right out of the gate, is to make them essentially twice as expensive as the schlock trash that we sell to more people using the entire internet and most of the retail system? I'm not so sure. Unless I'm incorrect and there really were thousands of people foaming at the mouth in anticipation of these:



amongst many other poor-to-mediocre catalog films that Shout!/Scream Factory have put out up to now. And it's probably generous to exclude many of their new release DTV features, which are probably destined to fall into deeper obscurity in ten years than these "Limited Edition" films have in three or four decades.

[Oscar Rothman]

Maybe The Velvet Vampire and Deathstalker DF.

[StingingVelvet]

Originally Posted by McCrutchy

So the appropriate solution, right out of the gate, is to make them essentially twice as expensive as the schlock trash that we sell to more people using the entire internet and most of the retail system? I'm not so sure. Unless I'm incorrect and there really were thousands of people foaming at the mouth in anticipation of these:

Have you considered that sales for those titles are perhaps what led to this decision? Or sales of other similar titles? I'm not a Shout employee but I doubt they did this on a whim, especially with such low numbers.

[McCrutchy]

Originally Posted by StingingVelvet

Have you considered that sales for those titles are perhaps what led to this decision? Or sales of other similar titles? I'm not a Shout employee but I doubt they did this on a whim, especially with such low numbers.

Certainly, yes. I won't argue the pricing too much, but a bundling option would be much better than $27 each plus five shipping charges. I'm thinking these are probably all BD-25 encodes anyway, they have only pre-existing extras, and even lack English subtitles, so they are about as no-frills as you can get if you want people like me to buy them. And really, I'm more generous towards these things than many, which isn't something that I want to put on a bumper sticker, or anything, but probably deserves pointing out at least once, seeing as I've never said something so self-serving before, but hey, I might die tomorrow, so...

I think $100 plus or minus shipping for all five discs is completely fair for the first wave, or at least $40 in August and $60 in September. Beyond that, if Shout! comes to us and says "these didn't sell, we have to charge individually for the next batch, or there won't be any further LE titles", then I'd completely understand.

One thing I always found curious is why the opposite idea is never tried. Okay, so you limit titles to a certain amount, but what if you sold all five for less money, instead of more? What if you sold each title, the same way, but for only $14.99 with free shipping, or even...wait for it, only $50 plus or minus shipping for all five?! Maybe they wouldn't sell, or maybe you'd sell thousands in a day, thanks to the customer base. But it seems odd that no one really attempts to find out if that works, and you would think that if any time is a good time to gamble for Shout! it should be now, surely.

[rickah88]

Originally Posted by schwano

I'll go one further.

I would have payed for these at the price they are asking for if the releases were at least staggered a bit. One a month would have been budget-able. Not 2 and 3 at a time, though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

This is nothing compared to the Asian steelbook market. They are much more expensive and the more popular titles sell out in minutes...and that's after everyone has been battling a crashing server for upwards of an hour.
The reason I mention that is, unless you have extremely deep pockets, trying to be a "complete line collector" will always get tougher and tougher.
And from SF's point of view they are basically damned if they do/damned if they don't, so like any other business that can't please everyone, they try to please as many as possible while making a few dollars doing so. Anything less, on a consistant basis, and they probably wouldn't be in business any longer and there's one less label out there putting obscure films on BD.
Again not bashing you, as I think it's admirable you want to go for the whole line(and do wish you the best of luck in your efforts), but when you're in business you HAVE to keep the money flowing in....all the time.
I've seen you post pics of your SF collection before and you remove all the slipcovers. If you have not done so already, you can easily sell a lot of them to offset the cost of these titles, if not outright pay for the whole lot.

[StingingVelvet]

Originally Posted by schwano

The more I think about it, the more cold I'm left feeling. ROTLD is going to be #175 for me when it comes next week, and all I can do is think about if I want to keep going. The money I could get for all the B-titles I own could pay for quite a few A-titles down the road. Considering the pedigree (or lack-thereof) of these titles, I could see myself just overlooking them personally, but the idea that this could become more popular as the line continues really rubs me the wrong way.
The deluxe limited editions you could take or leave and it's all swag.
The Halloween and Nightbreed sets made sense and you had a non-LE option.
The Vincent Price Collection was a rights issue and you had plenty of opportunity to pick it up.

Make it limited or make it expensive, but don't do both.
These would have been perfect for MOD.

The be fair the number of people buying EVERY Scream release is pretty low. I mean, I would guess less than a hundred people in the world have that goal, right? It's not the norm. These titles are super niche movies most people would never consider buying and Shout don't consider worth a larger print run and Amazon deal, so they're testing this method out.

Don't get me wrong, I don't like limited runs, but I can see why it makes sense for schlock like this and I think most people only buy if they really want the movie, rather than some loyalty or collector reason. I don't think Shout (or Twilight Time) are trying to take advantage of anyone, just trying a different method to make schlock like this profitable on blu.

[StingingVelvet]

Most of your arguments seem related to the high cost of buying all 5, but I don't think the vast, vast majority are interested in doing that, right? I bought Deathstalkers, and while $30 is a lot for two crappy b-movies, it's not unheard of. I paid $20 a piece for my other Corman schlock. If I wanted all 5 and was staring down a $200 bill to get them then I would probably be more pissed, sure.

The basis for this model is the few people who REALLY want a certain title being willing to pay more to get it. It's not a normal mainstream release model. It's not designed for people to buy all of them or even half of them.

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by McCrutchy

Certainly, yes. I won't argue the pricing too much, but a bundling option would be much better than $27 each plus five shipping charges. I'm thinking these are probably all BD-25 encodes anyway, they have only pre-existing extras, and even lack English subtitles, so they are about as no-frills as you can get if you want people like me to buy them. And really, I'm more generous towards these things than many, which isn't something that I want to put on a bumper sticker, or anything, but probably deserves pointing out at least once, seeing as I've never said something so self-serving before, but hey, I might die tomorrow, so...

I think $100 plus or minus shipping for all five discs is completely fair for the first wave, or at least $40 in August and $60 in September. Beyond that, if Shout! comes to us and says "these didn't sell, we have to charge individually for the next batch, or there won't be any further LE titles", then I'd completely understand.

One thing I always found curious is why the opposite idea is never tried. Okay, so you limit titles to a certain amount, but what if you sold all five for less money, instead of more? What if you sold each title, the same way, but for only $14.99 with free shipping, or even...wait for it, only $50 plus or minus shipping for all five?! Maybe they wouldn't sell, or maybe you'd sell thousands in a day, thanks to the customer base. But it seems odd that no one really attempts to find out if that works, and you would think that if any time is a good time to gamble for Shout! it should be now, surely.

This isn't tried with many labels because the cost of the rights, artwork printing, disc pressing, etc is a lot harder to make up when you're only selling 1000 discs, so they can't very well limit it to 1000 AND charge less money and break even unless they were getting the rights for free. Which they might have been in some of these cases, didn't they have DVDs of most of these already? I would obviously prefer if they'd limited it to 3000 and charged 1/3 as much, but I think they would have had a hard time selling that many through their site with titles like these (besides probably Deathstalker 1/2). Though, based on responses in this thread and Shout regarding this, there are a ton of people who just blindly buy EVERYTHING they release who would have bit that will now not touch these, so if they'd pressed twice as many and charged half as much they might have sold twice as many!

[rickah88]

Originally Posted by frakking toaster

And just think if they released these titles on amazon like all there other titles it would've been 17.99 all together for both. It's not like they don't release niche titles like this regularly. They've already put out titles like Exterminators from the year 3000, R.O.T.O.R, House Where Evil Dwells, Ghost Warrior etc

Probably, but not much I can do about that!
For me, it's a fair price for something I didn't think would ever reach the format.

[RodChester]

I'm in for Mesage from Space and Deathstalker. The price is a bit high and $7 shipping is butt, but having one double feature in there helps a bit.

It would be great if they did some sort of tiered savings. Order two save $3, three save $5, four save $8, five save $10. It's only a bit of savings, but I'll bet it would push some to order another title or two.

[rickah88]

Originally Posted by whiteberry

Might as well close the thread now...it's going to be 95% complaining about the limited editions and the price (a la Twilight Time)

Lol! That's, pretty much, every SF thread anyway.
I can't be certain, but I suspect there are a select few that won't ever support SF even if a given release was universally praised by the entire planet, just out of spite.

[cakefactory]

Yeah, that tiered savings would have been nice, since 5 of these at once is a killer for some people that wanted all 5. I mean, it doesn't matter for Scream's profits, since these will surely sell out anyway, but it is not good for people with limited budgets who want all 5 and will not be able to drop over a hundred bucks on these things before some of them sell out. Guess it's going to be a case of betting on the ones that will probably sell out quickest and leave the others for later.

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by rickah88

Lol! That's, pretty much, every SF thread anyway.
I can't be certain, but I suspect there are a select few that won't ever support SF even if a given release was universally praised by the entire planet, just out of spite.

Oh give me a break. Many of the people complaining about this so far in both this thread and the SF thread are the big scream factory fans who feel betrayed by these being so much more expensive AND being limited AND all coming out at once.

[Hellhound]

I'll probably get the Deathstalker set just because I've always had a fondness for the second one. I saw Time Walker in the theater as a kid and remember finding it pretty boring.

[StingingVelvet]

Originally Posted by RodChester

I'm in for Mesage from Space and Deathstalker. The price is a bit high and $7 shipping is butt, but having one double feature in there helps a bit.

It would be great if they did some sort of tiered savings. Order two save $3, three save $5, four save $8, five save $10. It's only a bit of savings, but I'll bet it would push some to order another title or two.

If I could blind-buy Message from Space for a lot cheaper I might have done so. Same with Velvet Vampire maybe. Because of the price I will just get Deathstalker. I think that's normal for this model though, they are sacrificing curious blind-buys for higher profit sales to fans. It's a calculated risk, and they're being upfront about the fact it's a test.

There are probably a dozen or two dozen Twilight Time movies I would buy if they were half the cost, but me skipping them is the gamble Twilight Time takes with their model. They know that.

[DetroitSportsFan]

Originally Posted by McCrutchy

One thing I always found curious is why the opposite idea is never tried. Okay, so you limit titles to a certain amount, but what if you sold all five for less money, instead of more? What if you sold each title, the same way, but for only $14.99 with free shipping, or even...wait for it, only $50 plus or minus shipping for all five?! Maybe they wouldn't sell, or maybe you'd sell thousands in a day, thanks to the customer base. But it seems odd that no one really attempts to find out if that works, and you would think that if any time is a good time to gamble for Shout! it should be now, surely.

People are definitely more likely to blind buy or add "lesser" titles to their collection when the price is right. Prices could be lower here, considering they're selling direct and don't have to split the profit pie with retailers.

[slasherdisc]

Up from the Depths and The Velvet Vampire are the two I'm most interested in. These are pricey, I wish they hadn't gone down the limited edition route. Oh well.

[rickah88]

Originally Posted by cakefactory

Oh give me a break. Many of the people complaining about this so far in both this thread and the SF thread are the big scream factory fans who feel betrayed by these being so much more expensive AND being limited AND all coming out at once.

"Betrayed"

Uhm, ok!

[cakefactory]

Originally Posted by rickah88

"Betrayed"

Uhm, ok!

What does this post add to the discussion? It's just weird passive aggressiveness that doesn't really state anything. It could have been shortened to a shrug emoticon.

There ARE several posts like that. If you want to write them all off as "Scream Factory haters" and shrug them off, I guess that's your prerogative!