Circuit City's Sneakily Smart BD Promo?
January 29, 2008

If you thought it was a big enough deal to get a free BD settop with purchase of a new HD TV set, think again!  Circuit City is offering three free BD discs with purchase of a any 1080p HD TV, valid for the week ending Feb. 2. Don't get me wrong, I'll basically take anything free with purchase. These three BD discs do feature fun films, 50 First Dates, Invincible and Night at the Museum. But, it seems that for a lot of people to truly enjoy the deal, they'll also have to shell out additional cash for a Blu-ray player, on top of snagging the 1080p. 
I'm going to guess that there's a good chance that many people in the market for a 1080p set are first time high-def TV buyers, and don't already have a BD player. I'll bet Circuit City is offering up the titles, potentially with studio help, in order to nicely soft-sell people into also checking out the BD players. Customers are going to have these BD discs that they won't be able to enjoy otherwise on their new 1080p's. 
Circuit City has offered various 'buy a high-def set, and get a free, or essentially free same branded BD player.' But I didn't see any listed for this same week ending Feb. 2. I say that if Circuit City is able to wrangle BD player sales with this free software offer, then it's genius.  Circuit City will get the additional cash register ring of the BD player, where it's not giving away revenues if the same player had been included in a bundle giveaway. BD manufacturers probably benefit from this as well, as they are probably sometimes financial partners with retailers in these buy one, get one hardware deals. The more BD manufacturers can get people to straight up buy their BD sets the better, right?

Posted by Susanne Ault on January 29, 2008 | Comments (2)