Netflix, the online movie rental site, has lost 800,000 subscribers in its most recent quarter. Customers were angered by the company’s new policy, which forces them to have two separate accounts: one for streaming movies online and the other for getting them via mail. Furthermore, the former $9.99 package for having both methods of accessing movies in one account changed to $7.99 for each separate account.
Since people will now presumably be looking for other venues to get their movies, does this mean that there will be a comeback for Brooklyn’s dying industry of video rental stores? The Ink asked some of Brooklyn’s movie vendors if they have noticed hitherto Netflix’s loss is their gain.
“Certainly a bad press surrounding Netflix has helped the business,” says Joseph Martin, owner of Reel Life South, a neighborhood movie rental store in Park Slope. He looks relaxed in his jeans, t-shirt and glasses that frame a round face. He hesitates to estimate how much it has helped, but nonetheless assures me that there has indeed been a boost.
“Brooklyn’s Best Video Store,” reads the subhead under the Reel Life South’s sign outside. Thousands of movie DVDs catering to all genres and ages are neatly stacked in the many shelves crammed inside the tiny store space.
But others in the borough’s movie rental business have not enjoyed Martin’s improved fortunes. Jay Green, Manager of Photoplay Video and DVD, has been operating in Greenpoint for eight years. He says that business has not shifted up or down since Netflix began to make losses.
“All of our customers use both Netflix and this store,” Green says. His view is echoed by Cisco Jenkins, who works at Royal Video on Flatbush Avenue. “Business has remained the same pretty much,” he says. “Although a few have said that they’ve come here because of Netflix.”
At Get Reel Video in Park Slope, Manager Sarah Silver says that Netflix’s woes have not translated into new customers. In fact, she says for sometime now, Netflix has been eating into her business. “It was pretty lively about three years ago but then more and more people found out about Netflix.” Silver adds that most of her customers are older. “For them, Netflix seems strange,” she says.
But Silver has benefited from Netflix’s loss. “To be honest, I’ve heard a few people say, “I’ve quit Netflix,” she says. Not only do older customers frequent her store, but also some younger customers who like the idea of renting from a local shop. “Lots of hipsters and students who have moved here to come to school find it cool that there’s still an old video rental store,” she says.
Meanwhile at Reel South Life, Martin is enjoying his new business. “I don’t think it’s anything coincidental that a lot of our old customers have returned,” he says. Like other movie rental stores, he says he has lost customers in the past due to technological innovations like Netflix.
Most of his customers are long-time Park Slope residents and he still believes that his old customers are what sustain the store. “People move to this neighborhood constantly, not just from America itself but also from other parts of the world,” he says. “But the base of this store is a lot of loyal customers who have supported us for a long time.”
Martin has owned Reel Life South for over ten years and has run two other movie rental stores in Williamsburg before. He closed them, he says, because the rents were too high. The Park Slope branch fortunately saw a different fate. “I would say that most customers are between the ages of 25 and 40. I think that’s the generation that recognizes the importance of local commerce,” he says.
Besides, he adds with a smile, Park Slope has an audience of film buffs. “People here are quite film savvy,” he says.
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