Netflix
NFLX,
has officially ended its DVD-delivery service, and will allow all DVD.com subscribers to keep their discs after Friday, Sept. 29, for free.
The streaming company announced on Friday that the last DVD the company sent out via an iconic red envelope was the 2010 film “True Grit.” DVD.com, through which Netflix has operated its legacy by-mail service, now redirects to Netflix’s primary website.
What’s Worth Streaming: How to maximize your streaming in October 2023, and why Netflix is all you really need
Netflix posted the following message about the end of its DVD business:
“In 1998, we delivered our first DVD. This morning, we shipped our last. For 25 years, we redefined how people watched films and series at home, and shared the excitement as they opened their mailboxes to our iconic red envelopes. It’s the end of an era, but the DVD business built our foundation for the years to come – giving members unprecedented choice and control, a wide variety of titles to choose from and the freedom to watch as much as they want. Today, we wanted to take the opportunity to thank you for watching.”
Despite Netflix’s primary business as a streamer, the company has still been delivering DVDs, aka “digital video discs” or “digital versatile discs,” to consumers on DVD.com. Like its streaming model, its DVD delivery service has different plan types based on customers’ needs.
DVD.com has multiple plan offerings just like Netflix’s streaming platform.
Netflix
The DVD service generated $145.7 million in revenue last year, which translated into somewhere between 1.1 million and 1.3 million subscribers, based on the average prices paid by customers, according to the Associated Press. Netflix made $31.6 billion in revenue in 2022.
Netflix announced it was planning to shut down its DVD-by-mail rental service — the service upon which Netflix was founded prior to the rise of video streaming — back in April.
“Our goal has always been to provide the best service for our members, but as the business continues to shrink that’s going to become increasingly difficult,” co–Chief Executive Ted Sarandos said in a blog post titled “Netflix DVD — The Final Season.”
See also: As Amazon Prime Video adds commercials, here’s how streaming services match up on pricing
Netflix’s DVD business has dwindled in the past decade from more than $900 million in revenue in 2013.
After years of declining revenue, Netflix Inc. announced that it will cease renting DVDs by mail.
Uncredited
Netflix launched as NetFlix.com in 1998, a direct-to-consumer DVD-rental company and didn’t debut its streaming service until 2007.
Shares of Netflix are up more than 60% in the last 12 months.
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which is made up of major movie studios and streaming companies including Netflix, Disney
DIS,
and Sony Pictures
SONY,
and the Writer’s Guild of America agreed to end their months-long strike this week. Hollywood actors, represented by SAG-AFTRA, are still striking, although the union is expected to meet with the AMPTP next week.
Netflix did not respond to MarketWatch’s request for comment.
Read on (July 2023): Netflix criticized for posting AI jobs paying up to $900,000 while writers and actors are on strike