New Disc-by-Mail Service Launches

25 Jul, 2014 By: Chris Tribbey

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A new disc-by-mail service is up and running, and this one comes with a new twist.

Gainesville, Fla.-based start-up investment firm Entevia has launched DVD-by-mail service Vidiux.com, offering more than 7,000 DVDs and Blu-ray Discs at launch. With Netflix continuing to shed DVD subscribers, Entevia chief executive Javier Arroyo-Figueroa said he believes the service fills a gap.

“There’s a market segment of customers who always prefer the physical disk over streaming,” Arroyo-Figueroa said. “The disadvantages of video streaming are well-known: latency, degraded video quality, lack of features like multiple languages and closed captioning. Also, major players like Netflix and Redbox are sacrificing the rapid availability of new releases in favor of streaming.

“Since Vidiux does not provide streaming, we have no strings attached for providing new releases as soon as they are available.”

Arroyo-Figueroa wouldn’t share where Vidiux is buying its discs, but the service has a unique component: crowdsourcing of DVDs and Blu-rays. Consumers can send in their discs to the service and earn a 10% commission every time one is rented. The discs must be in their original packaging (no pirated copies accepted) and shipping and handling fees are deducted from the user’s account.

“This is still at an experimental stage, though we have received good responses,” he added. “Basically, a disc owner that uses our program lends it to us and obtains a 10% commission of the rent price every time the disc is rented. It is a crowd-source service.”

New customers pay 29 cents for their first rental, which are rented out by the week (a title arrives 2-3 days after being reserved). After that it’s $2.99 for a DVD per week, $3.49 for a Blu-ray.

“We don’t plan to expand into streaming, as that would subject us to the same restrictions Netflix and Redbox are facing on new releases — that's one of our differentiators,” Arroyo-Figueroa said. “I’ve seen lines of 10 people waiting for a kiosk to be available, just for returning a movie. Or others want to rent a movie, but have to wait for others to end their kiosk transaction. It might be really frustrating.” 

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