Blockbuster Rolls Out Blu-ray Format Across North America

DALLAS, April 11:
Blockbuster is offering customers movies in the Blu-ray high-definition DVD
format, for rent and sale in all of its corporate stores in the U.S. and Canada.

Blockbuster announced last
July that it would be making Blu-ray available in 1,700 of its stores, in
addition to offering standard DVDs. To highlight the availability of the
format, Blockbuster is installing Blu-ray kiosks in the center of almost 5,000
stores. Featuring a 42-inch high-definition TV with movies playing via a
Playstation3 console, the Blu-ray kiosks will enable customers to experience
the movie-viewing advantages of high-definition technology while also pointing
out that PS3 consoles double as Blu-ray players.

As for Blockbuster's
by-mail service, in addition to the wide selection of Blu-ray titles it carries
online, Blockbuster has begun offering online subscribers a Blu-ray preference
setting so they can automatically indicate that they want to receive all
available movies in the high-definition format.

"Blockbuster was the
first national retailer to accurately recognize and react to consumers'
preference for this format when we added Blu-ray discs to a large percentage of
our stores last summer," said David Podeschi, Blockbuster’s senior VP of
merchandising, distribution and logistics. "Now, with this national
rollout, we believe Blockbuster is perfectly positioned to drive consumer
adoption of this next generation DVD format and to become the customer's headquarters
when it comes to renting or buying Blu-ray movies, whether in-store or
online."

—By Irene Lew