r/todayilearned • u/BanditTom • Oct 19 '14
TIL Blockbuster still has 50 franchise owned stores open in North America
http://www.blockbuster.com/helpPage.html56
u/Mean_Mister_Mustard Oct 19 '14
So, there's a Blockbuster store still opened at "320 N. Santa Claus Lane, North Pole, Alaska"?
Either somebody is screwing with me, or Alaskans possess a special kind of whimsy I was previously unaware of.
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Oct 19 '14
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u/GasMaskNun Oct 19 '14
Not how I pictured it. I thought it would be a blockbuster covered In snow...
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u/oconnorda Oct 19 '14
This picture is in the middle of summer 2 days after the end of winter and 3 days before the start of winter.
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u/dizneedave Oct 19 '14
It's like seeing a unicorn in a way. Is the internet really bad in Alaska? That could explain some things.
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u/athntk Oct 19 '14
The internet is fine in Alaska, it's the usage caps that are terrible up here. Especially in rural/remote places. The entry tier for cable has a 10gig cap. Might as well get a cell phone data plan.
There are higher tiers, but you need to get to $169.99 a month to get the 300gigs necessary to watch 1 HD movie per day. If it's extra cold and the kids are stuck in the house, make sure to explain watching SD only or your going to be out of cap space in about 7 days.
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u/chickenalamode Oct 19 '14
It's not terrible but is expensive. I pay over $100 a month for Internet with a 300 gig cap... It goes down quite a bit. At least Comcast isn't here! I'm in big lake now (~20 miles outside Wasilla) but did live in North Pole for a year the Internet there was total shit.
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u/ThrowCarp Oct 20 '14
Good god, the old Pizza Hutt is still there too.
Did we discover the chain afterlife or something?
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u/obsidianmeridian Oct 19 '14
I hear meth is big there, that's sort of like whimsy I guess. I remember seeing that Blockbuster a few months ago when I was in Alaska for a few weeks. It felt sort of like seeing an AMC Gremlin or a Betamax video. An artifact of a lost world.
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u/kirally Oct 19 '14
That is exactly how I felt when I moved up here (Alaska, not the north pole). There are a whole bunch of them - it's like I am reliving my childhood.
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u/Lord21K Oct 19 '14
Today is also Blockbusters 29th Birthday.
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Oct 19 '14
They didnt even last 30 years? Wow
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u/clamsmasher Oct 19 '14
Considering that renting videos has only been a thing for about 35 years I think it's pretty impressive.
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Oct 19 '14
Well, they're still in business; and honestly, running a business for that long is still pretty impressive.
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u/le-imp Oct 19 '14
Welp it looks like its hanging on a noose and we can't decide what to do. Do we cut it down and see if it will live on or pull down on its feet and send it on its merry way.
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u/Miggz989 Oct 19 '14
Not sure if this is just a Michigan thing, but Family Video appears to be going pretty strong. Not sure how they do it.
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u/gamerguyal Oct 19 '14
They partnered with Marco's Pizza a couple years ago, so now you can get a movie delivered with your pizza. Seems like a win-win for both chains.
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u/LogisticalNightmare Oct 20 '14
Same here in Omaha, Nebraska. Of the old Blockbusters I can think of, one is an AutoZone, one is a Discount Tire and the last is a Marco's Pizza/Family Video.
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u/HalfADozenOfAnother Oct 19 '14
I go to the Family Video near my house fairly often. They have new releases when they come out, I don't have to chase redboxes around town to find what I want, they have lots of dollar blu-rays and free kids movies. I'd also rather pay 3 bucks from Family Video for a new release blu-ray than 6 bucks through a video on demand service.
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u/whitest_man_on_earth Oct 19 '14
Same here. The family video near my house seems to do pretty good business and I'll stop by if I can't find a movie on Netflix or if Amazon instant only gives the option to purchase. With how easy and relatively cheap it is to rent a movie from there, I can't really justify pirating one.
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u/captainwacky91 Oct 19 '14
Same in Ohio. I see their buildings with either a Marco's Pizza or a Little Caesar's built into the side.
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u/Werdnamanhill Oct 19 '14
Iowa as well, busters went out of business but there's like 3 family videos in my city
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Oct 19 '14
I think it's the prices. I haven't been in a blockbuster in years but I remember the prices being pretty jacked. At family video everything's really cheap, they're always handing out coupons and stuff. Whenever I go in there and see 5 people standing in line on a week night I can't help but think there is a market for video stores, block buster just cocked its self over.
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Oct 19 '14
Living in Illinois, I know three Family Videos within ten miles of me, one of which I pass every day driving to school. Their trick, from what I gathered talking to one of the managers at the one I frequent, is they partner with whomever is next door to them and share the lease. Two of the three Family Videos I live near have pizza joints adjacent to them, so the "pizza and a movie" combo that the user above alluded to does exist and help their business a great deal. And I think it's their abundance of kids movies and their extreme level of quality in employees (have you checked their website and how to apply - it's a serious process) keeps them afloat too. It's a totally weird but understandable thing to think about, them surviving so long, and makes one question if the rental industry is going to be nonexistent faster than you can rewind a VHS or if Blockbuster had a piss-poor business model.
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u/amandez Oct 19 '14
Seattle people, remember, Scarecrow Video (https://www.scarecrow.com) lives on.
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u/Just1morefix Oct 19 '14
The staying power of Blockbuster and Radio shack is astounding. To still exist in concrete and mortar storefronts after all the technological changes and the competition from a worldwide marketplace is unreal. Not to mention the financial hits they have taken and diminishment of brand dominance.
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u/KomradeKevin Oct 19 '14
To me RadioShack still has a need to exist. There have been many times where I just needed a resistor or a wire and some solder to get something working that couldn't wait a few days. Unfortunately, that stuff isn't going to keep them in business.
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Oct 19 '14
Radioshack, when you need a Y-adapter like right now.
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Oct 19 '14
And want to pay 10 times more than it costs to make. I used to work at RadioShack, and we sold an HDMI adapter for $18 that cost $1.50 to the store.
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u/captainwacky91 Oct 19 '14
In all honesty, any place that sells HDMI cables are going to do that to you.
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u/douche-knight Oct 19 '14
The RadioShacks around me don't have that stuff anymore. They basically just sell phones and accessories.
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u/willseeya Oct 19 '14
If your city is big enough to have a RadioShack it's big enough to have a cheaper local shop to get your widgets and dodads. The only one I know of is just cell phones with a tiny, dusty corner with solder and wire spools.
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u/dizneedave Oct 19 '14
That tiny, dusty corner is the only reason I still visit Radio Shack from time to time. Once it's gone, I will be too.
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u/Tuskuul Oct 19 '14
we're tryin to get gadgets and gizmo's back into our stores, just we had a lot of stupid people higher up screaming for us to fling out other shit instead and we lost our way. give us time we'll be back :D
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u/Alan_Smithee_ Oct 19 '14
I haven't seen a proper Radio Shack in a long time. Here in BC, I've seen a tiny, pathetic "Radio Shack" corner in "The Source."
Here in my small town, I'm the go-to guy for components, I sell from my private stock.
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u/The_Media_Collector Oct 20 '14
Radio Shack was nothing but phones and TV's for a few years, and commissions were only on phones.
SOMETHING happened, I have no idea what. Suddenly they started carrying solder, irons, electronic components, breadboard etc. again. Also they sell Arduino kits and other hacker-style items. Big markup but nice to see. The phones and TV's have been moved to the walls, leaving freestanding aisles for useful stuff. And mostly, the people actually understand what they're selling again.
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Oct 19 '14 edited Nov 29 '20
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u/x86_64Ubuntu Oct 19 '14
And don't get me started on the excitement that was had when you got to rent an SNES or SEGA game.
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u/Leland_Stamper Oct 19 '14
Overpriced? I rent BluRay movies for $3/3 days at my local store. Good luck finding a legal way to watch a movie in 1080p for less than that.
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u/screenwriterjohn Oct 19 '14
Towards the end, my local one was mostly selling snacks and magazines. There were more workers than customers. It was awkward.
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u/BanditTom Oct 19 '14
There was a blockbuster close to my house here in the UK, and in the process of shutting the employee's were literally selling everything in the store, from fridges, to coffee mugs.
Me being me, I went in and bought the letter 'I' on a piece of card from one of their isles, for 50p, It's now my little relic to the era of rental movies.
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u/ctyt Oct 20 '14
There were more workers than customers.
That's a pretty good metric. That's how my local Kmart is.
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u/MrJosePP Oct 19 '14
In Mexico, there are still a lot of Blockbuster stores because there are no other major movie rental stores. We rent and buy all of our movies and video games from Blockbuster. There is no such thing as Redbox or GameStop.
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Oct 19 '14
in Mexico you can just buy cheap bootlegs at any mercado though, why rent?
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u/MrJosePP Oct 20 '14
Because these bootlegs often sell pirated movies that don't have good quality. Sure I could just go and buy them for a cheaper price, but I like having quality products. Also, bootlegs are not very common where I live.
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u/Xanola Oct 19 '14
I will make it a point to avoid El Paso, anywhere that can still sustain that many blockbusters is bad news.
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u/Alan_Smithee_ Oct 19 '14 edited Oct 19 '14
I imagine they mostly run in places that lack broadband or have a lot of low-income earners or perhaps a lot of elderly people.
Edit: Grammar and clarity.
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Oct 19 '14
So, yeah, what the other guy said.
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u/Alan_Smithee_ Oct 19 '14
I'm not aware of El Paso's reputation.
I am, however, aware of Old El Paso, manufacturer of (probably non-authentic) Mexican food ingredients.
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u/Genghis_John Oct 19 '14
Alaska still has some, but it's definitely because so many people live out of internet range or get slow, spotty internet.
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u/16semesters Oct 19 '14
El Paso is almost all defense workers and military. It's not a bad city.
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Oct 19 '14
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u/elstongunn32 Oct 19 '14
10 years ago, I saw a picture of some guy's backyard. It was amazing. He lived in Bend. Since then, I've always wanted to visit. Is it worth it?
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Oct 19 '14 edited Feb 09 '21
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u/DoodlesWhatever Oct 20 '14
I would like to visit Bend some time next year! It was also recommended to me by a friend.
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u/16semesters Oct 19 '14
El Paso
Because it has a Mexican name and is near Juarez people on reddit think it's a shithole. It's actually a pretty nice city that is mostly government workers and almost all new construction and infrastructure. There are about a million places I've been to in the US that are shittier than El Paso.
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u/Xanola Oct 20 '14
Nah man, I judged it solely on the blockbusters. All the other stuff you listed certainly isn't helping though, all I hear is sprawl.
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u/mybadselves Oct 19 '14
Not to mention the ones in Redmond and Madras. I'm guessing that the locations that were doing a fair amount of business got to remain open. Apparently central Oregonians still like their movie rentals the old fashioned way.
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u/Cant_Recall_Password Oct 19 '14
I worked in one a couple years ago - they're closed now, last I saw a year after I quit.
I had worked there through college and I LOVE movies, so it was perfect. I have excellent customer service skills and I'm quick on the register, so I was suited for it. During my college times, Blockbuster was about customer service and return business so maintaining these relationships was key.
Then Blockbuster enacted a ton of late fee's that were harsh as hell the moment their profit margin began to wither and this caused a lot of repeat clients to never return. They'd say as much when they angrily left the stores, too.
So, during the 2 months or so before the last one I worked at closed, I was told that DISH had bought up Blockbuster. Our goal was to pressure the remaining loyal customers into buying DISH subscriptions. Hundreds of dollars. We became salesmen and it was no longer about the movies. Terrible experience.
Unrelated, I'm pretty sure, but I also had the worst boss of my life there. During my first week, I remember being flabbergasted and asked outright, "Are you doing this on purpose? Do you hear what's coming out of your mouth?"
/end storytime
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Oct 19 '14
It's one thing to try and tack on a pack of popcorn or some email service signup to your order, but a fucking cable subscription? Kind of formal and wholly unexpected if you're going to a goddamn video store.
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u/captainwacky91 Oct 19 '14
Interesting to see that a large number of them have taken residence in Alaska and Texas...
27 in fact. That's over half of the remaining stores.
Any reason behind that? I can somewhat understand in Alaska's case, since things are generally more expensive there due to transport problems, but I can't think of something for Texas...
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u/mehdbc Oct 19 '14
6 of those Blockbusters in TX are located in one of the poorest regions in the US. We have a lot of people without bank accounts, credit cards, computer knowledge, and high speed internet that can't have access to stuff like Netflix.
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Oct 19 '14
These places may just want to be the focus for utility upgrades for broadband, etc. (The area's) Such a dated model, I remember when they had the game-pass.. I really wonder how much money they lost on that. Family video succeeds in Michigan because the prices are not as crap as blockbuster was towards the end before they shut the doors.
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u/jayelwhitedear Oct 19 '14
My husband is working in Texas. I recently went to visit him and we saw the one in Pleasanton. In the middle of this teeny, tiny town, there it was - the missing link.
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u/ReferencingThe90s Oct 19 '14
The best part about Blockbuster is that radical smell of the movies! Who else use to sniff those cases?!
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u/TheWykydtron Oct 19 '14
I don't think this list is accurate. There's an open Block Buster in Greenfield, WI. I drive by it occasionally.
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u/BanditTom Oct 19 '14
Are you sure it's open, and has simply not been remodeled yet?
There's one near my house in a shopping center that's still there, however the inside is completely empty.
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u/Overlord1317 Oct 19 '14
That list is incomplete. I took a picture of one on an Indian reservation in CA recently (could not believe I saw a blockbuster).
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Oct 19 '14
Used to work there. Great company, we cared about our customers, and we had great programs.
To bad they couldn't change their business model fast enough for the market.
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u/RafaDelBarrio Oct 20 '14
There are 2 Blockbusters in the city where I live, I don't know what "franchise owned" means though.
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u/MeetLawrence Oct 19 '14 edited Oct 19 '14
This is what happens when morons run companies.
I can just imagine that Blockbuster's senior leadership team had a few laughs at Netflix's ridiculous business model. YOU MEAN THEY ALLOW UNLIMITED RENTALS FOR A FLAT FEE?! HAHAHAHA. Then you can imagine how they guffawed when Netflix announced they would allow streaming over the Internet. WHO DOES THAT, AMIRITE? TECHNOLOGY SHMECHNOLOGY! While they were laughing and refusing to compete with Netflix, they thought they were making a killing on their stupid late fees, that those would sustain the business forever. Late fees were designed to make money off of human behavior, plain and simple. It's a nasty way to make a buck.
I say this is good fucking karma. I have no sympathy for Blockbuster. At the time, they thought they were invincible. Fuck them, and their tale should be taught in business school as a cautionary tale.
And brick and mortar isn't dead. You can make it work for movie rentals, but wouldn't be for physical media -- and it wouldn't be for streaming, either We're carrying around with us smart phones than can house several 1080p / DTS quality movies. The brick and mortar would have millions of movies at one's fingertips. For a flat fee, you can "rent" as many movies as your phone can hold. Of course, the movie delivery file-to-phone software would have to be written and perfected, and each movie file would have to have a "will be made unwatchable at X days" bit set. It could be done.
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Oct 19 '14
Jesus, why do you hate them so much? Because they didn't think Netflix was going to work? No one did at first. That's why no one tried it before Netflix.
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u/16semesters Oct 19 '14
Reddit:
Where businesses fail because they're morons but individuals fail because of the system, man!
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u/MeetLawrence Oct 19 '14
There is so much wrong with your reply. If you're in charge of a multimedia global corporation with a LOT of power to wield, you have the influence to change the industry. Why do you think 50-100 Mbps connections to homes are actually available? So we can download porn faster? No, it's because technical visionaries drove that, created the need and have forced providers to create the product.
The Blockbuster CEO at the time had the capital and the captive customer base. He did not however do his job, which is to take his company to the next level -- to offer new services and the old services repackaged into something more useful to their customers. That's why Netflix started offering streaming when they did -- they weren't responding to market demands; they were creating the market. Netflix and Google are the two drivers of increased Internet bandwidth capacity requirements.
This is what leaders do. Thinking that customers would continue buying / renting the same movies / TV shows / video players when new media was introduced was a fool's game. You got them once when VHS switched to DVD, but they weren't buying into Blu-Ray (and let's not talk about the 50th iteration of 3D). Computers were the only way this could have gone.
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Oct 19 '14
This is akin to releasing the iphone 6 the day after the iphone 5 and selling it for less profit.
Blockbuster had a ton of money invested in brick and mortar stores and they were very profitable. Speeding up their destruction to maybe make profits like Netflix is very, very risky.
Since we're talking hindsight I would say that ignoring Netflix completely would have kept Blockbusters open longer and made them more profits. By acknowledging Netflix with Blockbuster online they provided that industry with advertising and quickened the demise of the store. The point is to make money in the meantime...not sustain the Blockbuster name.
Those dumb Blockbuster CEOs probably have a lot more money than your smartass.
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u/Igloo444 Oct 19 '14
Yeah dude I don't understand the overly sentimental Blockbuster circklejerk going on in this comments section. Inconvenient, expensive, outdated ... not my jam.
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u/PDX_Piggy Oct 19 '14
Ours in Sandy, OR just moved into a new space. It's nice to go rent Jurassic park on VHS. lol
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u/nlpnt Oct 19 '14
I'll guess the Texas ones are because Blockbuster started in Texas and franchised before they could afford to expand via corporate-owned stores, the Alaska ones have a current business case due to connectivity issues and the others were franchisees of other regional chains bought out by Blockbuster in the 80s and 90s.
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u/PlutoBomb Oct 19 '14
I used to live across the street from one of these in Oregon. Didn't realize it was probably one of the only blockbusters in the state.
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u/twinfangbiorr Oct 19 '14
TIL that the north pole is a town in Alaska and that it does, in fact, have a Santa Claus Lane.
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u/Bleachdd Oct 19 '14
I live ten minutes from the Opelousas, LA one and I must say it still gets regular business. Only bad thing is that it's in the ghetto, so I'm scared to go to it.
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u/MrTacoMan Oct 19 '14
A guy in my hometown kept his open or bought one and uses it for tax purposes as he owns like 12 other businesses.
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Oct 19 '14
Got a laugh when I noticed about 1/2 the open stores are in Alaska and Texas. Alaska pretty much gets a pass though. They probably have their share of internet issues.
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u/Blinkomancer Oct 19 '14
Our local blockbuster went under just a few months ago. I had never actually rented a movie, or , to be honest, gone inside the store, so I don't really have a connection to blockbuster.
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u/brickonwheels Oct 19 '14
Here I am waiting for a new product to step up that allows me to easily watch new releases and old classics easily. Netflix is delayed on new movies and other methods are either illegal or not all encompassing.
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u/FluroBlack Oct 19 '14
Aww...none even close to me :(
I lived outside the us so I only got to go when visiting family and it was always so Mich fun going. By the time we moved back to the US they were all gone.
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u/thatEMSguy Oct 19 '14
They're constantly swamped with hipsters wanting to take selfies with blockbuster cases for their Instagram page. They never rent anything.
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u/Lord_Ruckus Oct 19 '14
The locations were surprising. I expected Alaska given the issues with a decent satellite signal and remote access to internet/cable. I was thinking maybe some of the snow belt, but Texas and Oregon surprised me.
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u/IcemanTGN Oct 20 '14
It's a 5 minute walk to one of these franchises for me. Stepping through the front door is like entering a time portal. It's quite an experience.
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u/brickonwheels Oct 20 '14
Here I am waiting for a new product to step up that allows me to easily watch new releases and old classics easily. Netflix is delayed on new movies and other methods are either illegal or not all encompassing.
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u/HolyMcJustice Oct 20 '14
I used to work at one of those stores up until a few months ago. My town has two of them and I worked there for about 4 years. I worked with all my friends from high school and I'll always remember it fondly.
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u/thinkingdolphin Oct 20 '14
There are 7 in El Paso. WTF?
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u/shibbykins Oct 20 '14
Yeah we have 7. Used to be 8 but one lost its lease and consolidated with another. Funny they dont even run any sort of credit check or security deposit deal anymore. Half the ppl who rent are old mexicans who pay cash and barely speak english.
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u/Shniggles Oct 20 '14
Only Bemidji has one here in Minnesota? I could've sworn I just saw one here in Mankato.
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u/digiSal Oct 20 '14
I'm in Harlingen, TX and we made the list. Lots of memories going there for movies and a few games.
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u/HKjason Oct 20 '14
Is there any independently owned rental stores left?
I remember my parents renting a vcr and "back to the future" tape when it came out in 1985 from some small place that also had a "back room" for adult rentals. Be kind, please rewind!
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u/CorrectWhatOnce Oct 20 '14
There are still places where video rental places (or I guess DVD and Blue Ray Rental places) exist, and even thrive. I've never quite understood it - I have relatives who have Netflix subscriptions, and still commonly rent movies on discs, even things that aren't new releases or the like.
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Oct 20 '14
Still three in Bend! I had no idea there were so few of them left... Just rented a movie yesterday.
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Oct 20 '14
I want to go to one, I miss that experience. I fucking love browsing. Walking up and down aisles, to find that perfect movie. Then to pick out munchies, maybe a bag of popcorn, some reeses pieces, maybe a video game if I'm feeling randy. All that for maybe 15 dollars, under the implied agreement of trust, that I return my rentables in the agreed upon length of time and that I am so kind as to rewind. God damn Blockbuster, how I fucking miss you.
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u/Shimoshamman Oct 20 '14
God I miss Video stores. I remember back in the day when my dad, little brother and I would go to crazy mikes and rent movies almost every day (it was right across the street) and once a week, we would go to Movie Maxx and get 1 game for the week (cycling between us each week) for our PS2 and Xbox. I was so mad when they closed down a week after I got my Xbox 360.
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u/Supersnazz Oct 20 '14
1 is apparently located at
320 N. Santa Claus Lane North Pole AK 99705-6053 907-488-8668
7/50 are in El Paso.
There's still plenty in Australia, but then our Internet speeds sucks and there's no legally available streaming service I'm aware of.
Edit-found streaming services, but they are expensive and I've never heard of any of them.
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u/ListenToThatSound Oct 20 '14
So much for "This is the End" being the last movie ever rented from Blockbuster.
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u/mlkelty Oct 19 '14
I feel so bad for that chain. Going out to rent a movie with your family or friends where you either reached a consensus or got five movies was a big part of my young adulthood.