Netflix Spreads the Love: More Content for Canada

Canada

Over the past several years, Netflix built its streaming service from a fledgling add-on to its DVD-by-mail offering in the U.S. to the core focus of its business. Now it’s trying to replicate its streaming success in Canada by ramping up the amount of content available to subscribers there.

Through new deals with CBC, along with extensions of some of its existing deals for streaming content in Canada, the subscription video service is adding new content. Part of the addition are a number of TV shows, including multiple seasons of Weeds and The Tudors, as well as Canadian TV shows such as Men with Brooms and Republic of Doyle — and all five seasons of The Kids in the Hall.

Netflix introduced its first streaming-only offering in Canada in September, opening up to its first international market. But in doing so, it had to renegotiate streaming rights for the new market. As a result, the Canadian streaming service, which is priced at $7.99, or about the same as the U.S. streaming-only offering, lacks a good deal of the content that Netflix streams here. At last count, Netflix had more than 20,000 streaming titles in its library in its home market, but just 7,500 titles when it first launched in Canada.

Netflix isn’t saying how many titles the Canadian service has available now, though Netflix VP of Corporate Communications Steve Swasey stressed via email that it is focused on “quality not quantity” and said that the number of titles available there is “more than you could watch in a lifetime.”

Canada-themed photo courtesy (CC-BY-SA) of Flickr user Яick Harris.

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