MARCH 9 | Blu-ray Disc movies continued to outsell rival HD DVD through the month of February by a two-to-one margin, industry sources said as the first final numbers for the month began to trickle in.
Consumers bought around 250,000 units of Blu-ray movies during the month, compared to the estimated 125,000 units of HD DVD movies, according to industry sources.
Warner Home Video’s The Departed and Superman Returns were top-sellers on both formats. The Departed debuted Feb. 13 and had one of the highest first-week sales totals for either format, surpassing 20,000 units on Blu-ray and 13,000 on HD DVD, sources said.
Blu-ray sales also outpaced HD DVD by a two-to-one margin in January.
But the top January releases sold less than half of what February releases did. Lionsgate’s Crank sold 7,500 units on Blu-ray in January, compared to HD DVD’s top seller for the period, Warner’s Batman Begins, which sold through 4,100 units, according to studio sources.
“Every week it grows,” said Rich Marty, VP of new business development at Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, a Blu-ray backer. “It’s growing faster than DVD did. Each month it just looks more and more promising.”
Blu-ray’s lead has been attributed to sales of Sony’s PlayStation 3, which is in more than 1 million homes. Sales of set-top Blu-ray and HD DVD players were about equal in February, studio sources said.
Marty predicted the gap over HD DVD would continue to widen helped by a big-budget movie slate headed to Blu-ray, including next week’s Casino Royale from Sony.
However, execs at other studios said the numbers are still very small and either format could win over consumers.
“When they start talking about numbers, two-to-one, that’s really about the release schedule,” said Ken Graffeo, executive VP of marketing and head of high definition at Universal Studios Home Entertainment, the only major studio to exclusively support HD DVD.
Studios released about twice as many movies on Blu-ray during January and February, Graffeo and others noted. HD DVD studios will be releasing more movies in coming months, about equal to the number their Blu-ray counterparts are putting out.
During the first half of the year, Blu-ray studios are planning to release 265 movies on the format, while HD DVD studios have 257 movies planned for release.
“You can’t look at the last two months as a trend or as what the consumer wants to do in this format,” Graffeo said. “It’s really an artificial, short time period.”
Graffeo said Blu-ray numbers also are getting a boost from two-for-one specials offered by retailers and Blu-ray studios and noted that Amazon has halved the price of Blu-ray movies.
Total disc sales since the debut of both formats remains close. About 650,000 HD DVD discs have been sold since the format’s April debut compared to more than 675,000 Blu-ray discs sold, according to one studio source.
