Blu-ray Sales: Green Feeling Blu
May 18, 2011
Few new releases were able to make a real impact on the Blu-ray sales chart this week, but we did have a new number one. The Green Hornet earned top spot by selling 291,000 units and generating $5.82 million in opening week sales. By units, 38% of its market share was in High definition, which is quite strong.
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part I slipped to second place with 166,000 units for the week and 2.70 million after a month of release. It remains the best-selling Blu-ray of the year, so far.
The Dilemma opened in third place, but only served as an example of how weak the Blu-ray selection was. Its opening week numbers were a mere 44,000 units sold and $884,000 in consumer spending. Granted, it also struggled on DVD, but this is a bad result, representing just 18% of total units sold. On the other hand, Tron: Legacy sold an additional 34,000 units for the week to lift its total to 1.35 million units after more than a month of release. At this point, it has sold 53% of its total units in High Definition and not many releases can boast of a 50% sales ratio on Blu-ray. Tangled rounded out the top five with 33,000 units / $761,000 for the week and 2.41 million units / $57.10 million after six. A sales ratio of 31% is excellent for a kids movie and shows how the format has matured.
While The King's Speech topped the DVD sales chart, it only managed sixth place on Blu-ray with 32,000 / $737,000 for the week and 336,000 units / $7.03 million after three. That discrepancy shows that comedies and dramas are just not keeping pace on Blu-ray.
Compared to last weekend, the overall Blu-ray market was down 44% in terms of dollars and 28% in terms of units sold. Ouch. On the other hand, compared to last year, it showed some growth, up 2% in terms of dollars and 13% in terms of units sold. Blu-ray's market share was acceptable at 26% of revenue from 21% of the units sold. I would like to see these latter numbers higher, but when three of the top five selling DVDs are dramas or comedies, weakness is to be expected. Unfortunately, I don't think the overall market will be stronger next week, or the week after, or for the next month or so, as there are not a lot of prime releases coming out. This is not surprising, considering how terrible the box office has been for most of the year.
Filed under: Video Sales, The Green Hornet, Tron: Legacy, Tangled, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part I, The King’s Speech, The Dilemma