The race to capture customers who have found themselves stranded with out-dated HD-DVD players picked up this morning as Canadian electronics retailer Future Shop announced a new transition program toward Blu-ray DVD players.
Consumers who had bought HD-DVD players from any retailer can return them to Future Shop and receive $100 off the purchase of a combination HD DVD and Blu-ray made by either LG or Samsung.
The combo player will be able to play both formats, meaning those who had invested in HD DVD movie libraries will still be able to play them, Future Shop said in a statement. The offer is valid from March 7 until April 3.
The returned HD-DVD players will be donated to Boys and Girls Clubs of Canada for use in their after-school and evening programs, Future shop said.
The Blu-ray format, developed by Sony, and the HD DVD format, created by a consortium of companies led by Toshiba and NEC, had been competing to dominate the consumer market for high-definition content. Over the past few months support for HD DVD fell dramatically, until Feb. 19, when Toshiba announced the company would no longer manufacture or sell HD DVD players and recorders.
Future Shop itself had said it would sell only Blu-ray format players.
The biggest battle between two video formats since Betamax lost out to VHS in the 1980s ended when multiple movie studios, including Sony Pictures, Walt Disney Co. Warner Bros. Entertainment and News Corp.'s Twentieth Century Fox, opted to support the Blu-ray format.
Leaving Blu-ray the champion of the format war, Future Shop, based in Burnaby, B.C., estimated that 35,000 Canadians had invested in HD-DVD players and movie discs, and they were in danger of being left out of pocket. An estimated one million Americans had bought HD DVD format players too.
Future Shop's announcement follows yesterday's decision by Circuit City Stores to allow their customers to trade in HD DVD players purchased from the chain during the past three months. The usual return policy is 30 days after purchase, but Circuit City has extended the store credit for 90 days after purchase. An internal company memo leaked to several websites said Circuit City would give customers a Blu-ray player — paying the price difference, if any — or a gift card.
The memo said the trade-in would not be widely promoted and would only be made available if the customer requested it.
Digital Home Canada, a website dedicated to home-theatre enthusiasts, reported that Future Shop's move appears promising on the surface, but "most of the current players in the Future Shop line-up are discontinued profile 1.0 models or models that can be found significantly cheaper at other Canadian retailers."
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