Summary: Many companies are suffering and the video rental chain Blockbuster is no different. They have become bankrupt and plan to close 182 stores by April to try and get back into the swing of things. The company will do this in chunks though. hey plan to close 72 by January 1st and the remaining 110 by April. Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy in September, they are not the only rental chains struggling as Netflix and Redbox and really starting to take over video rentals. Blockbuster still has 2,900 stores in the U.S. and has already closed about 1,000. The company does not want to shut down as they are trying to renegotiate leases with many landlords. The company hopes to be out of bankruptcy around July. They are hoping with fewer stores the stores remaining will have higher profits. There are also new investors Carl Icahn and his crew who hope to help the company come out of bankruptcy and help them regain consumers.
Opinion: Many people believe that our economy is starting to turn around but with stories like this I can't help but believe it still isn't ready to come around again. I do hope that Blockbuster is able to start up again though. And I will admit that I am definitely one who has started using Redbox. Redbox is only a dollar a night for a movie while movie stores are usually about 3 dollars for a new release. Also I know many people who use Netflix because it is only $10 a month and you can chose from just about any movie you can imagine. It is hard to compete with such good deals. I think that movie stores should really lower their price or start to extend the amount of nights you can have a movie (especially the new releases). Hopefully movie stores and Blockbuster will begin to realize what consumers are more attracted to and start to run their shops that way.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40753485/ns/business-retail/
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