[ginja]

Have heard on this mornings news that Dixons are no longer to sell Vcr`s. Wellcome to the digital age UK..

ginja.

[cwips]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ginja

Have heard on this mornings news that Dixons are no longer to sell VCR`s. Well to the digital age UK..

ginja.

Can't say I blame them.

I wonder if that means just straight forward VCRs and still sell dual DVD/VCR combos?[*] Hope so! I've too many old tapes that (as life is just to short to 'backup' them to DVD) I'd be pretty miffed if my VCR bust and I couldn't replace it!

---
[*] Bliss would be a twin-tuner Humax (lots of GB, and TUTV too!) with recordable DVD and nicam VCR !

[linkinpark875]

Crazy! People will still want videos and if they will stop videos I hope they will be reducing the price of DVD recorders and PVR's.

[Sparkster1979]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ginja

Have heard on this mornings news that Dixons are no longer to sell Vcr`s. Wellcome to the digital age UK..

ginja.

Thats interesting, I was in the Dixons by Marble arch in Oxford street yesterday and there was this guy talking into a dictaphone (well thats what I thought it was). He was talking about VCRs and the history of them. When I was there the two things I remember him saying was about who invented the VCR and the fight/battle between VHS and Betamax (sp?). Wondered what he was doing but I think that has been answered now.

Sparkster

[linkinpark875]

They are still for sale on dixons.co.uk so better grab them quick!

[algenon_iii]

Well £150 for a DVD recorder isn't that bad for crying out loud. I'm old enough to remember when the only VCRs you could get for £50 were second-hand toploaders, I'm not an economist but I guess in todays money that'd be equivalent to £80 if not more.

[cwips]

Quote:

Originally Posted by algenon_iii

Well £150 for a DVD recorder isn't that bad for crying out loud.

I don't think any-one is saying that's not a bad price - it's just that (no matter how hard you try!) you just can't get the damn things to read tape!

[~Party Weirdo~]

I still think DVD recorders are too expensive at the moment. You can pick up a decent VCR for about £40 these days while the cheapest decent DVDR is more than treble that. OK, blank DVDs are less expensive than VHS cassette tapes, but the initial cost still puts a lot of people off. Plus, we still don't have a clear winner in the DVD-R vs DVD+R battle.

Anyway, isn't this in the wrong forum?

[mentore]

Dixons are probably ceasing to sell VCRs because there is no longer a big enough profit margin for them or ,more likely ,they are hoping to force the sales of DVD-RWs which are ,of course many times the price both in terms of the machines themselves and the media (DVD-RW discs).

I think it is a stupid move because the supermarkets will take the market both in terms of VCRs and blank video-cassettes.

The argument that people are buying DVD-Rs is fatuous and only the sensation seeking journalist-fatheads from "Today" would give the Dixons line any credence and publicity.

People will continue to time-shift with VCRs for a long time yet whatever Dixons and their bottom-line demand.

I bought two Philips VCR 840s top of their line for £100 each on-line from Comet and delivered to my door - one works perfectly being switched by the Philips DTR1500 Freeview box and the other ditto by my Echostar AD3000IPv sat receiver .My tapes I buy from Morrisons at about £1 each for a E-240.

I hate to think of the costs of replacing these with DVD-R/RW machines and DVD-RW discs.

Big mistake by some managerial twonk at DSG - I think..."Never be the first to throw out the old and never the first to take in the new"

Interesting to see if Comet & Co follow suite...

[bronson]

VCR's in a digital terrestrial forum!

[Peterrrr]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mentore

Dixons are probably ceasing to sell VCRs because there is no longer a big enough profit margin for

I agree. If only more manufacturers would produce a Freeview VCR (such as Daewoo) there might be a change in the fortunes of the VCR. After all what is the point in buying any equipment now without a Freeview tuner

[proddick]

So Dixons plan to sell customers £200+ DVD recorders (the sales staff will upsell from the cheap ones that don 't have a DTT tuner inside... I guess it is a good business strategy as the customer will be back in a year or two to buy a DTT one

[diablo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by proddick

So Dixons plan to sell customers £200+ DVD recorders that don 't have a DTT tuner inside... I guess it is a good business strategy as the customer will be back in a year or two to buy a DTT one

Good point!

I have 2 SVHS recorders and a DTT DVR for timeshifting.
I wll only buy a DVD recorder when they can record at the same quality as SVHS, which, from my experience, they cannot yet.

[David (2)]

Well, this is a bit of a shock. A few things spring to mind.

1) The shops have been reporting a slow Xmas so far. Saying your shops wont stock VCR's next year might help push up sales before the holidays! And then next year, just drop the idea, and keep stocking them.

2) There are far more people using VCR's than the new alternatives such as DVD Recorders and PVR's. So why drop a product that most people still use?

3) If Dixons do carry this out, will other shops follow, or will they continue to stock VCR's in the hope of cashing in on Dixons not stocking them.

4) On Sky, you have to have a Sky subscription in order to use the record function on their PVR (the Sky+). Cant see everyone doing that.

5) You can get Freeview PVR's now, without any subscription, but not everyone can get a signal, and lots of people dont want to spend lots of money on a new high gain aerial + expensive Freeview PVR.

6) Cable users dont even have the option of a Dual Tuner hard disc PVR, like those for Sky or Freeview.

7) DVD Recorders are more expensive than VCR's. £180 starting price. Lots of people wont get one for that reason.

8) Only about 1 DVD recorder has a Freeview tuner in built, and none ship with Sky or Cable tuners in built. Set a normal digibox to record to one of these DVD recorders, and you have to leave it on that channel for the duration.

Dave

[qpw3141]

Strikes me as a nothing more than a publicity stunt.

If VCR's sales were slowing, the normal retailer response would be to simply reduce the range available. So they can still take people's money no matter what they want to buy, but they would be giving more shelf space to the more popular items.

This way they're just saying, "No thanks, we don't want your money, would you please go somewhere else and stop bothering us, you cheapskate".

The only possible rational reason I can think of for them doing this is that the admin costs of handling returns of faulty VCR's might be high enough to outstrip the very small profit they make on each machine.

[pd45]

Quote:

Originally Posted by diablo

Good point!

I have 2 SVHS recorders and a DTT DVR for timeshifting.
I wll only buy a DVD recorder when they can record at the same quality as SVHS, which, from my experience, they cannot yet.

What crappy dvd recorders have you been looking at then

[EEPhil]

Quote:

Originally Posted by qpw3141

Strikes me as a nothing more than a publicity stunt.

If VCR's sales were slowing, the normal retailer response would be to simply reduce the range available. So they can still take people's money no matter what they want to buy, but they would be giving more shelf space to the more popular items.

This way they're just saying, "No thanks, we don't want your money, would you please go somewhere else and stop bothering us, you cheapskate".

The only possible rational reason I can think of for them doing this is that the admin costs of handling returns of faulty VCR's might be high enough to outstrip the very small profit they make on each machine.

Agreed. Not only have Dixons got themselves on every news media - they have got themselves covered both ways since Currys (part of the Dixons group) will continue to sell VCRs. They can't lose, and they've got free publicity.

[sanderton]

VCRs have been very reliable for years, and as the only possible reason to buy one now is to replace a broken machine, sales must be getting pretty low.

They are also mechanically much more complex machines than DVD recorders, so the profit margins on those untra cheap machines must be wafer thin.

Dixon have doubtless decided that the presence of low rent 80s tech in their shops doesn't fit with their intended blue LED image, especially whne the money they bring in is tiny.

But they are still being sold by other DSG outlets, so it's just a Dixons brand image thing.

[Hamlet77]

AND guess who just bought a brand new VCR not two weeks ago.

Never let it be said H77 had a sense of timing. Never used the flippin' thing yet either, having said that it does look good with the new telly and DVD.

[jaxconrad]

It's interesting news. I'm sure sales must be genuinely pretty low for Dixon's to do it. Even as a marketing gimmick it would be a foolish just for a bit of publicity. Its quite amazing how quickly the DVD has taken over isn't it. Prices for recordable DVD's have dropped quite quickly already and I suspect that if the budget manufacturers jump into the recordable market, then it will definitely accelerate the demise of the VCR. One of the reason why the whole DVD thing took off was the abundance of cheap machines, if the market can get the cost of a recordable DVD player down to appox £60-70, then I think we'll definitely be seeing similar moves by other retailers, or at the very least, retailers scaling back on the number of models they carry. No doubt in a few years, VCR's will be like turn tables on Hi-fi's. Still available, but mainly for playing your old collections. On a personal note. I actually bought a TiVo (PVR) about 2 years ago and never really used my VCR much after that, so much so that when the VCR died on me about 12 months ago, I just binned it and never got a replacement.

[Multisandia]

This should hopefully warrant a drop in PVR prices, fingers crossed.

[Corin]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hamlet 77

AND guess who just bought a brand new VCR not two weeks ago.

Pardon me for asking, but was the purpose of the new VCR to play back old tapes?

If not, why did you not consider a digital recording medium?

PS Why is there a severe case of apostrophe abuse in the title of this thread?

Is the original poster a greengrocer?

[kev]

Quote:

Originally Posted by linkinpark875

Crazy! People will still want videos and if they will stop videos I hope they will be reducing the price of DVD recorders and PVR's.

DVD Recorders are £139.97 in Asda now, it wasn't too long ago that you had to part with £150 for a NICAM VCR!

Iwas soo tempted the other day,if only to be able to record channel 5 (my VCR doesn't record it properly - have to tune another VCR to Channel 5 then record that ones output, the ghosting confuses my VCR otherwise )

Shame none of the DVD Recorders i've seen come with onboard DVB-T recorders (as well as Analogue ones)

[nwhitfield]

Being a cynic, and reflecting on the massive amount of money DSG makes from extended warranties, I wonder how much they'll push them with DVD recorders.

Must be pretty hard to flog an extended warranty with a video recorder now - people have had them for long enough that they know it's likely best to just buy a new one.

DVD kit, on the other hand. Well, that's shiny new technology, innit mate? Best to have an extended warranty with it, just to be on the safe side, eh?

Nigel.

[PraisetheBeeb]

Does anyone actually shop in that dreadful chain of electrical superstores, with expensive prices and the worst customer service you are ever likely to have the misfortune of experiencing anyway??