Eros Ties Up With Wal-Mart; Price Wars Hit DVD/VCD Industry

Eros international has announced its collaboration with retail muscle man, Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) to sell Bollywood content through Wal-Mart’s in Canada.

Eros DVDs will be available in 27 Wall mart stores to start with and then spread across the Canadian Wal-Mart store network.

Wal-Mart shelf space is the holy grail for any DVD retailer, its decision not to carry HD-DVD was what in part what ensured the end of the format wars and victory for Blu-Ray. In the US, Wal-Mart is the cold sharp sword by which ancillary revenues for movies are judged, quite a coup for any movie distributor.

Back home, the price cuts in the DVD ,VCD business appear to have taken a toll on the industry. According to this ET article, the Rs 100-150 price point strategy introduced by Moser Baer has hit a soft spot, prices, formerly in the range of Rs 250-400, have gone up in the past six months.

Moser Baer who has in recent times brought price points from triple to double digits is willing to sustain for a long run, expecting to vertically integrate by launching its own movie production business and thus writing of licensing costs. Although thats fine for IPR owned content, doubt a price differentiation strategy, a mainstay of the FMCG industry, will work for a commodity like content in the long run. We had recently done a round-up on the online video rental business here and a price comparison of BigFlicks retail venture here

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